Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Hidden among the rocks of an enormous cliff east from the village, the boy sighed, tapped his foot twice, and retied his hair for what had to be the tenth time. His companions shot him annoyed looks from their hiding places. He didn't mind. This assignment was boring him out of his mind. He hadn't seen action for a whole week, and now they sent him to watch a deserted path in dull silence.

The Tsuchikage was growing increasingly worried about this supposed spy from Kami-knows-where. Apparently, someone had been sneaking in the archives and gathering knowledge about the village's earth-based techniques. He could understand the old man's worry; the Rock ninja were among the most competent in the world and the security was tight, yet someone was managing to fool them for what had to be close to two months, already. This was no petty criminal.

So here was his group, waiting for the suspect. Usually, stronger shinobi would have been assigned for something of such importance. But the village, always in need of money, had sent most of them in the riskier and therefore better paid missions, the remaining being in guard duty around the village. Plus, this was their chance, as a team, to prove they were capable of fulfilling harder missions than those they were usually assigned to.

The curiosity and even excitement at the prospect of fighting the mysterious spy who misled the village's best sentinels lasted for something like fifteen minutes, until the group realized they would have to wait for an undetermined amount of time. He couldn't help being fidgety; his duties usually involved more action.

To be honest, fidgety was an understatement. His skin felt irritated as if burnt, his breath was almost as fast as if he had run a long marathon, and his heart beat so hard he could hear it. Shifting a little to ease the pain from being stiff for long, he reached for his pouch. It should be filled only with ninja supplies, yet he took out his favorite source of entertainment.

The comfortable weight of the clay was most welcomed, and he closed his hands over it. The boy could feel his teammates watching, but that didn't bother him. His hands twisted, his fingers pressed and his nails cared for the smaller details. The shorter part of his long blond hair escaped the tie and covered his eyes, but he didn't mind. He was so used to this he could almost do it with his eyes closed.

A few more minutes and his hands opened completely, to reveal the finished work.

"This one looks so real!", said the girl who was further away from him, also hidden but visible from his angle. "They always do."

Really, it was not this great, Deidara thought as he inspected the sculpture in his hands – but he had to admit, he liked it when other people praised his work.

"I wonder how you manage to make them, and so fast."

That was the other boy, closer to him. He must have been sincere, for he was the one who had been telling the group to stay very still and silent, yet was now loudly praising him.

"That's right, it's impressive. You're an artist, Deidara-nii."

That made him frown. Artist? Of course he was. Since small, he was working on his talent. But this thing wasn't art. It was small, unmoving and colorless. Art couldn't be like this, it simply couldn't! Annoyed at the kunoichi's ignorance, he closed his hand into a fist, smashing the still soft figurine back into a ball of clay.

His teammates looked disturbed by this, specially Kurotsuchi, who was opening her mouth to start one of her annoying tirades.

They tensed.

It was barely noticeable, but something was coming from the dirty road they were sent to watch. While it could be many things, this was a forbidden path for anyone to take without permission. Calling chakra to his ears, Deidara concentrated his augmented hearing in order to listen what was further away from him, and ignoring what was closer.

There was it: the unmistakable sound of steps over earth and stones, crunching a twig here and there. The rustle of clothes. The rattling of what must have been items inside some sort of bag.

Deidara frowned. If this was a ninja, it was a ridiculously clumsy one. Who would try to infiltrate the Rock village making noise that, in shinobi terms, was an absolute scandal?

His companions probably thought the same, since they relaxed considerably. And suddenly the horrible tension inside him was back, demanding release, and he just wanted to fight. Whoever this person was, they were screwed. There would be nothing but an unrecognizable pulp in the floor when he was done. Prudency gave way to anger, and he fixed his eyes on the road, ready to attack as soon as they appeared.

It looked like his companions suddenly could feel his temper, for they gave him worried looks. The steps drew closer and he appeared - an old man wearing modest beige clothes, worn out sandals and a huge straw hat, and carrying a voluminous backpack.

Kurotsuchi jumped down before any of them could, and Issamu sighed. They had agreed beforehand he would be the one to intercept the stranger, since he was older looking than both Kurotsuchi and Deidara.

"Stop right there!" She said in a demanding voice, or as demanding as a twelve years old, short for her age girl could be.

The stranger looked doubtful. Not even the headband was enough to help her, it seemed. Issamu followed Kurotsuchi, making the man instantly apprehensive.

"You're trespassing into a forbidden area. The only permitted way to the village is through its main gates. We're taking you into custody." He said it in a monotonous tone. It looked like he wouldn't even do the standard procedures of checking for weapons and hidden items. This man was probably some civilian trying to sells goods here without paying taxes, Deidara thought, and they spent a whole day waiting for him. He would never have the battle he was waiting for.

"Trespassing? No, no!", the man held his hands in front of him with open palms, in a gesture of surrender. "It's just that the way to the gates is too long, and the sun does no good for my health."

"You're coming with us."

"No, really, I am just visiting my brother..." the pathetic stranger said, taking a few steps to distance himself from the stoic ninja.

The dark haired boy looked like he was going to say something else, but Deidara gave him no chance. The old man bothered him, his hands were clenching tightly, his chakra just wanted to be used, and it looked like people just wanted to talk. He leaped.

Kurotsuchi screamed and Issamu tried to restrain him, to no avail. Deidara felt exhilarated, trembling, and a little insane. He felt his agitated chakra finally synchronize with his wishes, now that he wanted to put it into use, rushing to his hands in a familiar way. Locking eyes with the man's wide ones, he prepared his first strike.

The old man's eyes suddenly narrowed in the determination seen in experienced fighters, surprising the blond, but he was far too gone in his rage to heed to the instincts warning him that this was a dangerous foe. The man looked like he would try to block his fist, as Deidara hoped he would. This guy was in for a nasty surprise. There was a reason people avoided hand-in-hand combat with him.

As if reading these thoughts, the stranger jumped out of reach with an unexpectedly quick movement, avoiding just in time the enormous explosion that left Deidara's suddenly open palm.

Damn it, not bad. Most people were fooled by this one, and ended being blasted while thinking they were just blocking a young boy's punch. The man jumped up to the cliff that was the team's hiding place a couple of minutes ago, and looked down at the damage with calm, unimpressed eyes.

For some reason he couldn't really explain, that made Deidara's blood boil.

His teammates seemed to have come out of the shock of having the scared foreigner being a ninja and were now in fighting stances and sending him signals, but Deidara paid them no mind. He was the stronger in the group, and could end this himself.

He jumped to where the man was. Now that he already expected the enemy to be fast, he wouldn't allow him to avoid this strike. He often fought opponents faster than himself and won.

Making it look as if he would attack the man directly, he directed the explosion to the rock the man was standing over in the last moment, making him lose balance. He was quick to regain it, but that moment of distraction was enough to direct a blast to his chest.

"Water release: water encampment wall."

There was not enough time to commemorate, for the debris quickly faded away and a water shield blown out of the man's mouth was visible, protecting the him from any damage.

Deidara cursed. His explosives were dual types: They were earth and fire based, and while the earth should make them stronger than the water, the fire was in disadvantage to the element, in the end making both his and the man's techniques equally powerful.

But then he studied the barrier before it fell down, with a pensive frown.

It was not perfect, and he would have expected such a skilled fighter to be able to master a barrier ninjutsu, if it was of his element, or not perform it at all. The shield was defective, had a few hollow spaces and some visible openings that could be targeted in order to take down the whole construct with a precise, calculated strike.

"Water release: rising water slicer."

Water jets were directed towards the blond, and two managed to make him fall down. Were they done properly, they would have cut him in a half, but in this situation, they just forced him to back away. Looking up from the ground, he already knew the enemy had the advantage of being on top, and honestly didn't want to start a game of trying to reach him. Better to end this in his favorite way. Smirking, he started gathering a great part of his explosive chakra to both of his hands, preparing to land a strike that, from his experience with demolition, he knew would take the whole thing down.

A fierce kick to his gut interrupted his plans. The air from his lungs felt gone as he fell to the floor, clutching his stomach, and lost the grasp in the fierce chakra that was ready to leave his body. Most of it turned violently back to his core, leaving him stunned and trembling, and a smaller part burned the skin in his hands.

Deidara let out a soundless scream and looked up just to see Kurotsuchi trying to hit the man's neck from behind – and he escaped, the bastard! – and then he jumped and turned back to the same road he came from, fleeing from sight.

Issamu ran after him, while Kurotsuchi went down to see if Deidara was well.

---

The three chunin had their eyes lowered to the ground as the Tsuchikage angrily listed the reasons why they failed, after hearing the report. Deidara made sure to keep his head bowed. He usually didn't take rebukes well, but didn't want to protest and give his teacher and leader a reason to send him to jail.

And the short old man behind that enormous desk was right, no matter how much he hated to admit it. The spy's escape was partly his fault and while he was no goody-two-shoes, failure was still a bitter pillow to swallow. He wasn't used to such a sensation, being one of the strongest – if not the stronger, he often told himself – ninja of his rank. His talent as a fighter combined with his bloodline limit would usually take care of most foes, when allied to some strategy. Now he had to deal with being berated as he hadn't been in what felt like ages, because of that arrogant, impassive man who fooled him, who looked down at him.

All the greater reason to hunt the bastard, and bring him down.

This wasn't the moment for such thoughts, however. He turned to pay attention to the Kage's tirade, lest he anger the man and get a worst punishment than whatever must have been reserved for them all.

"You're all on probation for two weeks. I will make sure to cure you from your carelessness and disobedience. Dismissed!"

Great, just great. He had thought they would be assigned to humiliating D-rank missions, but of course such light punishment wouldn't even pass through the man's head. Probations were assigned to ninja who were showing incompetence or unruliness in the field. Apart from its humiliating factor – the clear display of how you weren't fulfilling your superior's expectations – there was the fact that it usually consisted on training in a much harder level than the usual, as if they didn't work to their limit in a normal day already. To put it simply, it was constant corporal punishment and humiliation to make sure you and whoever watched you made sure not to repeat the mistake.

Yet, he wouldn't complain. He could only be grateful that everyone thought he had realized the old man was a shinobi. Now they saw him as an irresponsible and hotheaded but very perceptive person. Ha! Whatever he would get if anyone discovered he attacked that person with everything he had while believing the guy was a civilian, it surely wouldn't be pleasant.

He left the room in quick strides. Issamu didn't follow. The stoic boy was probably horrified by the failure and the punishment, Deidara groused mentally, since he always did his very best and was all full of following the rules and being a good boy.

At least he could be alone. Probation started tomorrow, and he had no wish to talk to those two right now.

"Deidara-nii!"

Well, damn it.

"I should have known better, huh!" He snarled, and then coughed. Since when was his voice so scratchy? Kurotsuchi looked at him with a confused frown.

"What?"

He cleared his throat and spoke with a clearer voice. "Nothing. What do you want? If it's an apology, you will wait for the rest of your life, yeah."

They all heard Issamu reporting he kicked Deidara in order to stop him from setting an explosion that would hit her, but he really didn't notice she was approaching the enemy that moment. Besides, she was the first one to act carelessly, being the first to intercept the enemy when they clearly told her not to.

She looked up at him with an unhappy expression. "It's not that. It's just that you've been silent, nii-san."

The blond blinked, confused. That was it? His silence? Looking back in time, he could imagine what she meant. When was the last time he had spoken? Complaining about the nurse who cleaned his wounds too roughly and refused to give him anything for his headache?

Why had he been so silent? He usually wasn't very talkative – people around him were boring as hell, wanting to talk about the insignificant happenings in their lives and nothing else. But surely he should have had something to say to his teammates in the past days they worked together. Yet now he could remember being silent and withdrawn. That wasn't like him.

Weird.

Not that he would share deep thoughts about his actions with the little pest who looked up at him with concern in her eyes.

"I just don't have anything to talk about to that ice cube Issamu or you and your little crushes, huh. Go home."

Kurotsuchi started getting red and protesting about what he said, but he gave her no time, jumping over the nearest hoof and making his way to his apartment from above. She'd better not follow. He wanted some peace.

He sure didn't want it the last few days, though. It was easy to remember being fidgety, unquiet and violent. Right now he felt so much better – bored and frustrated, yes, but that insanity was gone, and he could concentrate and look at objects and people without suddenly wanting to destroy them.

His destructive chakra was becoming a bother again. It would always accumulate and run fast through his veins, taking crazy patterns and not letting him think rationally. He usually didn't have such a problem when he worked at the Explosion Corps. It demanded a lot of him, and liberated the excess, leaving him equilibrated. But after being assigned missions that involved stealth and silent attacks, it kept building until it felt like Deidara himself would explode.

Entering the second floor apartment through the window, the boy threw himself in the bed, looking at his bandaged palms. It was very rare that his bloodline limit would hurt him. Yet, he was grateful he had it. It made him different from the others, gave him strong emotions and feeling and destructive power, and he liked it.

Deidara narrowed his eyes, concentrating. He already knew this technique very well, but this didn't change the fact that he could lose his hands if he got distracted. Gather his chakra, the normal one that felt as easy as breathing, to his center. Feel for his other chakra, the burning, agitated energy that sometimes made him shake, and have it ready. Direct his normal chakra to his outstretched hands, creating a barrier, a shield that would protect his fingers and his palms from the impact and the heat. Direct his other chakra, the one that felt like it had a life of its own, to his palms, focus outwards…

And release it.

'Explosion release: landmine fist!'

The explosion that left his hands completely destroyed the dummy he was training with, and the wall behind it. Somewhere far away someone shouted, probably because he had yet again ruined the place, but he could only relish on the sound and the heat and having that energy finally out of him. He let out a long breath and wiped his long hair and the sweat off his brow with his long sleeve, feeling a tension he didn't know was there leaving him.

"-so irresponsible! And useless! How many times do I have to tell you? You can kill your opponent with a considerably smaller explosion! In almost any place, it will either end them immediately, or incapacitate them! There's no need for such waste of energy!"

The rush of excitement left Deidara, but he was good humored after having got ridden of his stress, and looked up at his instructor. "Sorry, huh. But it's been days since I could work it out of me, so I could not control it."

It being his bloodline limit, the one most of the shinobi in the Explosion Corps had – the explosive chakra with effects no one could imitate with normal body and mind energy.

"Bullshit!" Some spit flew from the roaring jonin, and Deidara had to force himself not to curl his lip in disgust. "You forget I have the same ability as you, boy? Even when I had just discovered it I could control it better! I've stayed days and even weeks at a time without using it, and I know there's no such thing as the energy becoming too much and all of that you say, everyone here knows! You're just an attention seeking brat!"

"Sorry, huh", he said again. "Not happening again. Really."

Or at least not today, was the silent thought. Deidara would be the first to admit he was not a cooperative person. He could and would put his needs and wishes before other people's whenever he could, when it wouldn't end in punishment. He was in a shinobi village, after all.

But when it came to his bloodline limit, he honestly did not have a choice. Since very small he had been identified as one of those with explosive release – The village was always searching for children with it and knew what signs to look for. Not that it took an expert to discover him. The enormous amount of chakra that had been building on him started to make him burn, and burn other people, and other things he did not exactly remember in the mass of memories of hospitals and bandages and being poked at by curious doctors. It was abnormal and didn't have an explanation, but it looked like everyone had forgotten about it by now, if the way they looked so offended at his behavior when practicing was anything to go by.

Going to the other side of the room, he started training with his explosions again, and this time he could control them much better. Losing himself in the exercise of attacking precise targets with carefully calculated damage, he ignored the people grumbling behind him about how he was faking it all along. He had been through this too many times.

He left his bed with a jump. Deep contemplations about the past bored him. Still in his chunin uniform, he decided to go out and search for more clay. There was almost none left in there, and he was suddenly struck with inspiration. Surely he would be able to create something, even with his hurt hands. Maybe this would be the one.

---

Negligent kids.

Once again, Issamu was left with the hollow feeling of failure. Of not being able to do the very best no matter how much he tried. Only, this time, it was much worse.

His teammates said it wasn't normal, to be so focused on work, but they were still children, in some ways.

Children who had already killed people.

But it was interesting, the way that even after taking someone's life for the first, second, tenth time, and having their bodies splattered with the enemies' blood, both of his teammates showed some childish characteristics from time to time, even if the true innocence was forever destroyed, as with anyone who started the ninja life.

Kurotsuchi was the worst, with her moans and complaints about anything slightly bothering, her sighs and excited exclamations at the smaller things, and constant whining. At first, he thought it was a façade, until he got to know her better and know that yes, she managed to keep the child inside her almost intact.

Deidara was quite different.

Issamu would frequently feel bothered by both his teammates' antics. There he was, doing his very best to complete his missions and any duties as swiftly and competently as possible, and one would act recklessly and misunderstand or purposefully ignore commands, while the other would play with his sculptures and forget the task at hand.

Yet, he could respect Deidara. Once he managed to see past the stigma the boy carried from his village – an insolent, powerful but incompetent idiot – he could admit the blond was above him in some aspects.

Deidara had been the first one among them to kill. In fact, he was the one who was sent in assassination missions; He targeted and destroyed, while Kurotsuchi and Issamu would only kill when the enemy wouldn't give up in battle and couldn't be restrained, and that didn't happen too often. Besides these extra missions the blond was sent to alone or with a team of older fighters, Deidara also trained harder than his teammates. Issamu knew it was because of his bloodline limit. He always admired and respected the Explosion Release as one of the village's treasures. He wouldn't want it, no – he wasn't one for overly damaging, powerful attacks. He was more focused on strategy. He also could see the price that was paid by those with the gift. While Issamu and Kurotsuchi as young children learned how to write well, to have good manners, respect tradition and played with friends, Deidara was being taught how to control the explosive chakra, where to hit to kill or demolish, and receiving taijutsu conditioning.

That was why he had to wonder, frequently, if Deidara's insolent attitude, his love for destruction and obsession with sculpting – the first and the last very rare among the Rock ninja – were just a result of too much pain and suppressed feelings.

But then he would see one of these rare moments when true excitement would shine in his blue eyes, when he had a hard, tiring fight and won, or when he was satisfied with one of his sculptures, and then he was convinced that that was the boy's true personality. If Deidara had no skill or was lazy, he wouldn't be alive right now.

It was also impossible to ignore Kurotsuchi. Most people once considered her nothing more than the privileged granddaughter of the Tsuchikage. but her control of the earth element was impressive for her age, and she could even manipulate a second element, the water – and that was truly impressive – plus the gruesome training she voluntarily went under every day proved that she was more than capable of being part of their team and help them in achieving their goals. He knew she would grow strong, and just needed to be a little more prudent.

Issamu was proud of his ability with genjutsu, even though he would never allow himself to slouch in the development of new and stronger techniques. Casting a high level illusion required not only great chakra control, but also a strong memory and creativity – one that could take on the aspects of nature, people and the elements, and be able to perfectly reproduce them in the opponent's eyes. He would study different settings, places and people at diverse situations and times, in order to be able to project something that would truly trap his enemies. He almost considered it an art, if he were to care about it like Deidara did. Yet the other boy insisted on disdaining his ability.

But he knew there were no true hard feelings among them, and they were a good team, equilibrating and compensating each other's strengths and weaknesses.

Now he would go home, already knowing how terrible the next two weeks would be, starting from tomorrow. But he would not blame his teammates for he also failed to follow protocol. Someday, he would made sure every one of them completed the missions with perfection.

In the end, he was glad for having his two comrades.

---

As soon as she got to the training ground, she started stretching. Still feeling terribly frustrated about their mission's failure, Kurotsuchi was decided to do her very best in these two weeks of training-only, and no one would stop her and her friends from completing whatever assignment they got after the end of the probation.

As she completed the exercises, her instructor pointed her to a familiar person. Akatsuchi was her cousin and her friend, even though they didn't see each other as frequently as they used to, now that they were part of different teams. He was quite good at taijutsu, and she knew it was almost impossible right now for her to be the best in this spar.

So they fought for a long time, but only because he held back when he had a chance to finish her. The black haired girl tried not to feel bad because of that, and knew she would get better results if ninjutsu was allowed right now.

Her confidence grew once it was time to train her elemental techniques. Right now she wouldn't be using it against anyone, but would try to achieve the same results anyway. Some ninjutsu could be used even without an opponent.

"Earth release: earth shore return."

The ground in front of her flipped upwards like a trapdoor, creating a barrier right in front of her. It was quick to make, hard and useful against frontal attacks, and was good practice before she started trying for stronger defensive techniques.

Making the proper hand seals, she started attacking her own barrier with earth bullets. It was a higher ranking technique than the earth barrier itself, but the shield kept strong. Her defense had always been better than her attacks. She tried to focus her assaults into specific points instead of hitting random places, but the barrier still was up. She had to better her offensive ninjutsu soon.

After some more practice with the earth element, it was the time for her second set. She was not as good with water as she was with earth, but was progressing slowly, and could create attacks that would overwhelm ninjas from her level and below.

"Water release: wild water wave!"

This technique was supposed to divide in two attacks that would hit from different angles.

It flowed out of her mouth as per usual, but was strangely harder to mantain. It was like when she lost the grasp on her chakra, but only, she didn't. Yet when the jet, already looking weak, divided, the right side hit the barrier with practically nonexistent strength – the result she would get from using a hose, honestly – and the other fell to the floor before even reaching it.

People around her looked at her with worried frowns or sneers of contempt, but she paid them no mind. What was happening? She had almost mastered that technique weeks ago, and now was having the same performance as when she tried it for the first time.

Maybe the water element was harder to control than earth, then. She'd just try again. Forming the correct seals – dragon, tiger, hare - in a slow but more secure sequence, she concentrated once more…

To obtain the same terrible result, only now the jet couldn't even divide, and fell to the floor like a dead, splattered snake.

She moaned and stomped her foot in frustration. This made no sense!

"Kurotsuchi!"

She turned at her instructor. The tall man looked at her with an arched brow, his forefinger tapping his chin.

"And what was that, just now?"

"I don't know!", she said. "I was great at this technique the last time I tried it. Really!"

"I know. I saw it. It makes no sense that you have such weak control of it now. What happened?"

"How would I know?" She replied, moodily. "It's like I can't grasp the water with my chakra, or something like that, and it falls all over. But I'm doing everything exactly as I used to."

The man kept looking at her, and she wondered, impatiently, if he would find a solution. This was embarrassing and frustrating. What did it matter to dominate a technique, if it could fail completely and for no reason at any moment?

"The past months have been hard on you", the man finally said, as if reaching an epiphany. "What with being assigned to harder missions than people your age, and with that boy, to make it worse." Kurotsuchi bristled. She knew perfectly which of her teammates the idiot was talking about, but knew better than to protest. It never worked. "And now, you're on probation because of failing your last mission. It must be difficult, since things used to be easier for you, but don't be too hard on yourself, alright?"

The black-haired girl blinked twice, and then realized what he was trying to tell her. "What? That's not it! I'm not being hard on myself. I just performed my earth techniques perfectly a few minutes ago! Didn't you see it? At all?"

The jonin just looked condescendingly at her and walked away, talking about the necessity of leaving one's emotions during battle and more nonsense. Exasperated, she prepared to make the same hand seals, this time the simplest variation of the technique she knew – one of a single jet of water to hit a target. Good to down… well, a civilian. There was a reason it was only used as an introduction to a new water user.

A hand on her shoulder stilled her, though, and she looked up at her plump cousin, who was smiling down at her. She knew he wouldn't say the same things the instructor did; he knew better than to do it.

"Don't be so worried at it. There's no problem. I mean – there is, somehow, but I don't think it's focused on you."

"What?" She was confused. "What are you talking about? What problem?"

"I've been out on a mission to Mist two weeks ago, you know? I think Tsuchikage talked to you about it", he said discreetly, and she nodded. There were signs of Mist starting a tentative alliance with one of Rock's enemy organizations, something that could affect their village in many ways, and some team had been sent to investigate. So it was Akatsuchi's. "Well, this isn't to be told to just about anyone, but I think lots of people already know it anyway – the Mist ninja's abilities with water are terrible. I mean, they are capable of doing quite some damage, but still, for their usual standards… They used to be scary. You know it, you saw it firsthand. But now, even ninja we already know to be strong looked like they were having problems to control the element, and their attacks and defense were clumsy. It was weird."

"That's… crazy." She murmured. "How could lots of people lose their talent with a technique? Including me?"

"We don't know. But those are the facts, and my team was not the only one to see it. People were talking about it before." He scratched his head. "It's not something people would miss, you see? Mist has some of the fiercest ninja in the world. To watch an inept performance from them is something very unusual."

Kurotsuchi didn't know what to say. She just got to know about it now, and was as clueless as her friend. "So… the mission was easy? That's it, and they're weak now?" That would be weird. What would the rest of the world do, if the village of Hidden Mist lost its power? Surely there would be nothing left of it.

"Of course not. Most ninja aren't made just of ninjutsu, you should know that. They're focusing on taijutsu, genjutsu and weapons, now. They are still to be respected, no matter what is happening now."

Kurotsuchi nodded, feeling silly. Of course. But those were still disturbing news. Leaving her cousin – one couldn't just have a merry talk in middle of training for too long without being noticed, after all – she went back to her earth jutsu, and at least that worked comfortingly well.

---

Easily avoiding the kick aimed for his face, he grabbed her leg and pulled, punching her hard in the cheek but avoiding breaking her nose. Kurotsuchi fell backwards but quickly got back up, trying to ignore the throbbing pain in her cheekbone.

"Let's stop it now."

"Let's not", she protested, but he was already walking back to the stands, where they could rest. The sun had already set, but the ground was still hot. Kurotsuchi followed him with an unhappy frown on her face.

She almost got him with that kick… right? Sitting beside him, she looked up at the blonde. He had a bored look, elbows resting over his knees, face tilted to the side.

But Kurotsuchi could see through the apparently relaxed position.

Deidara had been through another sparring session with his superiors – or fighting, for a spar was supposed to stop when the opponent couldn't get up. When she thought she had it hard, she remembered about her friend.

The Explosion Corps had always been ruthless with its members, voluntary ones or not. She once asked her grandfather why they were trained harder than other shinobi, and he said the bloodline limit didn't manifest too often and so, the ninja that had been 'blessed' with the special chakra had to become perfect weapons for their village.

It wasn't like she couldn't understand this idea. She, too, was one of those who abandoned the possibility of a peaceful life in order to protect their home and make it stronger. But what she couldn't accept or understand was people's attitude towards Deidara. How could his teachers and superiors treat him like that? Rock was not, by any means, a pacific, friendly village, but there was some camaraderie and loyalty between comrades. But those bastards clearly enjoyed hurting the boy, even when he couldn't stand anymore.

Yet Deidara never broke, never asked them to stop or make it easier. He would somehow stay stubborn and proud, even when he couldn't get up from the floor.

Was that brave or foolish?

They stayed in silence for a while, until he moved. Discreetly, she observed as he picked some clay from the always present pouch that rested in his waist, closed his hands over it and start working. She liked it so much when he did it. Since very small, she would observe his sculpting. He was really good then, and more so now. It was nice that he had a hobby. She wished she could create something beautiful on her free time, too.

The birds were her favorites. He had to have some book on different species all over the world, for some were unlike any she had ever seen before, and surely he couldn't have taken them all from his imagination. Deidara created so many different things she could only conceive he had a very big shelf on his house, full of the most varied creatures. She would never know.

And he was such a good shinobi. Kurotsuchi admired those who were strong. She always pushed herself hard as to be as good a kunoichi as she could be, and fulfill the expectations her village and her grandfather had of her. She wanted to be powerful and respected and useful. Most people who observed Deidara's antics thought he was just a careless boy who would always be the chunin useful to destroy some mountain that was in the way and maybe sire a child with the explosion release ability, but those who spent more time with him like her knew better.

Deidara was very talented, and while he didn't loudly proclaim undying loyalty to his village, his progress was astounding. When he had a worthy opponent, he would show he had much more than a bloodline limit. He was so faster, so stronger, so more powerful than the average chunin. He was born to be a shinobi and would probably be jonin level someday, but no one would think it prudent to give the unstable boy who refused to follow the plans a higher ranking position.

Still, she looked forward to his growth. He would climb to greater heights than anyone expected him to, that was for sure.

A few more minutes, and he was done. She took a peek, and loved it. She would usually praise him and then go back to whatever she was doing, but perhaps today…

"Can I keep it?" She asked softly, before she could stop herself. It would be so nice to have something of the boy who was like an older brother to her.

The blond looked surprised. He should be, as she was seven years old the last time she asked for one of his little sculptures. Back then, he crushed it, saying it wasn't good enough. She never asked again, until now.

He looked hesitant, but then extended his open hand to her, the white bird resting on his palm. Surprised, she smiled and reached towards it. His sculptures were always so close to the real things it looked like this one would spread its wings at any moment and fly. It was endearing.

His hand closed into a fist, like before, back in their failure of a mission.

"What good will it do, gathering dust in some box with your little trinkets, huh?"

The smashed pieces of what was the figure she admired fell through his fingers, and she felt an unexpected surge of anger. What was his problem? Not only he denied her request, but also destroyed the piece in what looked like a childish provocation. She wanted to tell him it would not be placed in some box, but in her nightstand, with the few treasured objects she liked to touch or look at. Instead, she silently got up and started walking away from him. There was no need to turn back to know he wouldn't be following. He tolerated her presence better than he did other people's, that much was obvious, but that didn't mean he would care about how she felt about him.

If Kurotsuchi ever entered his house, she would discover there were no shelves full of beautiful little figures and, from the mess in the floor, that he always destroyed everything he created.

---

The Fourth Spring celebration was one of the biggest events in the Rock village. The civilians and the shinobi, men, women and children, the rich and the poor would gather and be a part of the festival that announced the start of the planting season, when the food price and the taxes would drop, and when they could finally use the earth again. Those who struggled to make their ends meet wouldn't have to worry about not being able to support their families for some time, and those more financially fortunate wouldn't need to pay so much for imported goods, and could also develop their fortune by selling what they grew here. The streets further away from the center of the village were dark and silent. No one would want to miss the gathering.

No one but Deidara, at least. He sat in the small bedroom of the second floor. It was silent there too, everyone else gone. No children crying, no people laughing, no steps on the apartment above his, or the noise of the dragging of furniture or even the dogs' barking. The animals probably knew they had a good chance of getting some free food in the place all of the humans decided to go to at the same time.

It would be peaceful, if his breathing was not so harsh, if his heart was not beating so fast and strong it felt as if his entire body was reverberating in synchrony with it.

If his blood was not burning so hot, if his head did not hurt so much and, specially, if he weren't feeling so much hatred.

He was so tired of it all.

He looked at his work of the past two weeks. That ugly thing could not be called art. It could not be called interesting or good or anything positive, no matter what these fools said. They would give him smiles and praise him and say he had so much talent. But he did not. He thought he was special, since he was a child. He would look down at others and be happy that he was different, because he could create such special things with his hands, and he would be only getting better and better, and someday he would be a great artist and surprise the world. And then maybe, just maybe, everyone would open their eyes and see the world as he saw it, and realize that it was a waste of life to wear fake expressions and fight for stupid causes and go through the same routine every day, because life was short and fleeting and should be beautiful, not a wait for when they would become old and worn and retire and die, without leaving anything in this world but their equally useless offspring.

He got up slowly and clumsily walked towards the statue. The crouched kunoichi looked back at him, positioned ready to attack. Her eyes should show some thrill, but no matter how much he tried, she still looked like a corpse positioned in a failed attempt to look alive.

Trying for the first time to create a human had been a mistake. It only highlighted the fact that his creations were still painfully far from art.

No one ever saw this one. He had spent weeks on it, using the free time he got from his ban of missions at night, first completing the image he had on his head, and then adding and removing details, changing a little bit here and a lot there, trying to infuse some emotion into the thing, make it at least a little closer to what he had in mind, something he could be proud of. Every night he would kneel before her and try to discover what was missing, like a medic nin trying to resuscitate a fallen comrade and finally giving up, because there was no way to put life back – or in this case, for the first time – in their eyes.

No one would ever see her. She was the same as all the others he tried to make beautiful and failed – his aborted creations, born from his hands already dead.

Putting his hands on each side of the white, still form, he knew this one was too big to simply crush in a fist, so he called his bloodline limit and watched his last work disappear, becoming dust and little pieces under the force, heat and noise of the twin explosions.

Deidara kept still as he watched the last little pieces fall in the floor and the air slowly clear of the debris. He felt better, and not just because of the release of energy. He felt better after seeing his creation explode. There was some emotion, some meaning in seeing it being destroyed in such a dramatic and noisy way, like a more fitting funeral for something he put his mind and effort on. The frustration felt at his constant failures was still there, but it eased a little.

A couple of determined knocks made him jump.

---

Kurotsuchi knocked on the door twice, feeling more than a little annoyed. This enormous festival happened only once every four years, yet this antisocial idiot that was his teammate insisted in locking himself inside that ugly apartment of his. She never entered there – was never invited, and Deidara was quite frank when saying he didn't want her to visit, at all – but she was sure it was as poor in the inside as it was in the outside. Sometimes she forgot he lived in one if the poorest streets in the village.

A few seconds passed, and then the door opened wide. Well, that was unexpected. She thought he would be more secretive about his place, peek through a slim opening at her or ask for a password or something like that.

Looking up at him, her tirade about how he should participate in the village's important moments died.

His face was red and covered in sweat. His chest went up and down with his fast breathing. The blond hair was unbound and all messed, and his eyes looked tired and, at the same time, crazed.

This was what he looked like in their mission two weeks ago, bar the tired part, when she could feel his weird chakra spiking and feared he was temporarily insane. Right now he was not as bad as he was then, but almost there.

"What do you want? Huh?"

She started, having forgotten she was the one who knocked and was expected to say something. Divided between worry and intimidation, her determination gone, she just said in a voice that sounded like a pathetic apology, "I was wondering if you don't want to go to the festival."

From the confused frown on his face it was as if he had forgotten, but surely he would have wondered about where the rest of the world had gone? Looking behind him, she tried to see what had him so distracted.

It was nothing like she expected. While yes, the place was as poor as she expected it to be, the horrible mess there was something she thought she would only find in the Explosion Corps. Pieces of what she recognized as Deidara's clay were everywhere. The floor was damaged and burnt, and so was half of the furniture. The air vibrated with chakra she recognized from the aftermaths of a battle with anyone who had the explosive bloodline limit.

What in the world was happening here?

Deidara became alert when he heard her gasp, and suddenly blocked her vision, his glaring eyes demanding she focused her attention solely on him.

"If I wanted to, I would be there, huh. Not like I could have forgotten, with everyone chattering about it for weeks. Is that all? Huh?"

Kurotsuchi wanted to say it wasn't, and that she was worried about him, and wanted him to go out and listen to the music, buy something he liked, laugh with his fellow citizens and maybe find a girl to have a crush on, all of the things normal people his age would be doing tonight. But the air around her still roared with what sounded like the leftovers of killing intent, ready to come back at the slightest provocation, and the scene she could observe was definitely caused by Deidara, who was obviously very unstable. Her instincts told her to leave, and she decided to obey. "Yes, that's all… good night."

She only hoped he would be alright, and that the whispers and murmurs about the boy's growing insanity were just nonsense, even though everything right now proved the contrary.

---

The festival was over, but its results were clear. The streets were being cleared from leftovers and decorations, there were still some foreigners walking around, and everyone looked noticeably content. He could probably blow up a bomb here and the survivors would smile and wave at him.

Shaking his head to banish the ridiculous thought, Deidara walked towards the Kage office, below which was the underground cache where two guards would be waiting. Back in active duty, he strived for action outside the hellish training he went under the Explosion Corps the past two weeks, but not even that could change the worry that had been occupying his mind.

It was interesting that, after a good night of sleep, the actions that sounded so rational yesterday disturbed him so much now.

He could remember every moment with details, and every emotion. That time had been one of his worst, and he had been so close to destroy the whole building and, maybe, the whole street. And the feelings! Nothing else made sense but his art, the destruction running through his veins, the heat and his trembling limbs.

Kurotsuchi's reaction to the whole scenario was fresh in his mind, and he couldn't blame her for being so frightened. It scared him, too.

He was going insane.

That was the harsh reality; what he heard since his childhood was, after all, true, and he saw it with more clarity now than ever.

His bloodline limit was taking control of him. While he already knew that the best way to stop it was to rid himself of every excess of energy, the idea of having to periodically engage in violence in order to preserve his mind sounded so binding, so constraining. He was used to maim, attack and destroy – even enjoyed it – but he couldn't and wouldn't become a slave of the explosion release.

Moreover, the stress and sickness could be interfering with his creations. How could he expect to create true art when he was physically and mentally ill?

This village was the only one that had shinobi with this ability, or so he had been told. Surely he could find information about his problem.

With that in mind, he had gone to the Tsuchikage and asked permission to research about his bloodline limit. While Rock had an open library, scrolls about one of their most powerful abilities would, for obvious reasons, be hidden from general public.

Being granted access to the underground chamber that held the precious knowledge was easier than he expected it to be. The blond was already prepared for a refusal, since the powerful leader probably wouldn't want someone who had a reputation for being careless and impulsive near the village's important data. Yet here he was, allowed to research as much as he wanted. There were two jonin level shinobi who were following and observing him, but he expected no less. Anything else would have made him suspect this was a trap.

Positioning himself in front of one of the shelves, he started to search. While there was a considerable amount of scrolls there, when the subject was just the explosion release, a few sections were all he had at his disposal. He opened the first one, ready for an avalanche of technical vocabulary he wouldn't understand, but it was quite simpler than the advanced genjutsu texts he once tried to understand and failed.

This one explained about the necessity of invoking medical chakra to cover the surfaces of skin where the explosion was supposed to come from, and talked about treatment for accidental burns on the user. He was so used to these techniques it felt like he had already read that scroll many times, even though this was the first time he held it.

The next one was a theory, in general, about what allowed some people – people like him – to wield such power, and studies and experiments trying to transfer the ability to ordinary people.

Deidara snorted. Of course this one stopped in speculation and blind guessing, and showed no true results. People often forgot about working on their own abilities while trying to acquire other people's, and failed.

And so it went, in the opening and closing of scrolls, and carefully returning them to their right places, lest he bother his guards and got dragged out. Sometimes he dismissed a scroll as soon as he opened it; other times, he would get interested in what he found even if it was not related to his main objective, and tried to absorb as much knowledge as he could in the short time left. There were some interesting techniques that could prove useful, like the Explosive Palm, that allowed the user to deflect objects back to the enemy.

Reaching the end and already disappointed for not finding any traces of a way to control his explosive chakra, he pulled one of the scrolls at the bottom right corner and opened it with rapid and fluid motions.

It had his name.

And not just as a name among other names of people with the kekkei genkai; This scroll was all about him, with diagrams, charts and speculations about his body and mind.

It was… disturbing, to find something like this here.

He read thoroughly, twice. It contained his basic information like date of birth, blood type, physical characteristics and details about his parents.

He never heard of saw anything about his father and mother. They had died when he was very young and could have been MIA shinobi or civilian casualties, for all he knew. Because, If he were to be honest, he never cared much about finding information about the people who put him in this world.

A quick look proved him right in his disinterest. Just a couple of unknown civilians, who never saw battle and, apparently, never did anything extraordinary, either. The bloodline limit must have been dormant in one of them, for a person with the explosion release wouldn't be allowed to refuse to serve as a shinobi – Deidara knew that too well. With disregard to the brief information about his family he turned to other topics, even though he did memorize their names, and the name they had given him when he was born. It wasn't Deidara, and he quietly wondered about who changed his name, but didn't care enough to keep the trail of thought.

Half an hour of studying and he knew that yes, this scroll was all about him and his chakra that was an anomaly even among the Explosion Corps, but it didn't have any useful information – just pointed problems without any solutions. And that he had a strong allergy to acetylsalicylic acid. Well, that explained the nurses' refusal to give him anything for his headaches.

Instincts told him to close the scroll and tuck it in his jacket, but the stares he could feel on his back made him know better. No matter how uncomfortable he was about leaving the thing for anyone who entered the place to read, he had to. It was Iwa's property, and not his.

Halfheartedly, he took a look at the last scrolls. This search was proving almost fruitless and he already started worrying about the next step he should take to try to control his chakra.

His wandering mind didn't miss the symbols at the top of the scroll he just opened, though.

He almost jumped, but managed to keep his position unchanged and his breath even. This was a forbidden scroll. He knew the kind, having been sent on two missions to retrieve those. They had powerful techniques that were forbidden to use or teach and only the village's Kage could reach for them. Any tentative to steal or learn or do anything about those were considered treason.

What the hell was one of those doing in his hands?

The best action would be to alert the guards behind him. Or maybe he should just leave the thing here and go straight to the Tsuchikage to inform him about it. Yet, the curiosity about its contents was too strong. It was probably related to his bloodline limit, and to be ranked at such a level of danger, it couldn't be something irrelevant or weak.

Against his better judgment he kept his reading, carefully hiding the symbols at the top and making it look like a normal scroll. A quick and discreet glance at his back showed the two jonin were paying more attention to the way he handled the scrolls as to be sure he wouldn't try to take any with him than about what was actually inside the scroll – understandable, since it wasn't like there should be such a secret in here.

Still, he couldn't be caught looking at it.

A sweep of his eyes grabbed the most important parts.

- to infuse objects with one's own chakra –

Detailed graphics with the hand seals and necessary procedures in order to achieve something he never heard about.

- could achieve remote control when done properly –

Topics pointing the benefits this could bring in battle, and what the objects should be like if the user wanted to succeed.

- Timed explosions at a great distance –

A technique that would break the barriers every explosionist had learned to live with.

- stronger power and range than normally possible –

And if the person who wrote this thing was not exaggerating, this would multiply the destruction power by several times, making someone with the explosion release much more dangerous than anyone would expect.

- like giving life to unmoving things –

A tense pause.

Like giving life? To unmoving things?

That was all the boy got to see before forcing himself to close the scroll and put it back with the others, as if it was one of those of little interest to him. It would do no good to show excessive attention to it and so, he could not dwell in any of the topics. In a sea of excitement and fear and conflicting thoughts, he still managed to keep his face composed, his breathing gentle, his gestures as they were before he found the kinjutsu.

He reached for the last scrolls not inspected yet. What would the two behind him think if he suddenly lost interest in what was left, after such a long search? Careful to inspect every last one with what looked like keen interest, all he wanted to do was to pick that one scroll back and absorb every last drop of information from it.

After twenty more minutes of pretending, he got up slowly, and those who called him incompetent and inept at self-control would never know there were so many rushing emotions behind his bored, disappointed mask.

Like giving life to unmoving things.

Unmoving things like a doll, or a puppet? Or maybe, perhaps, a rigid sculpture of white clay?

Still with his escorts, Deidara walked up the stairs, the scrolls appearance and position perfectly memorized. It was only proper, since he would be back to retrieve it.

---

The mission ban ended the day after the festival. Their team was officially active again. Alongside her dark haired teammate, Kurotsuchi presented herself to the Tsuchikage to report themselves as ready to work.

Deidara wasn't there. Issamu was obviously irked with their teammate's absence, while she could only worry and, for what felt like the millionth time, wonder if she did the right thing by leaving Deidara alone in his apartment yesterday. At that moment it looked like the best thing to do, but what if he somehow needed help? If something had happened to him?

Her grandfather's voice called for them to enter. She quickly wiped the preoccupied frown from her face before entering. He wouldn't approve of it.

"Tsuchikage-sama", were the twin greetings from her teammate and herself. "Our ban is lifted and we would like to know where we are needed", Issamu continued by himself.

The man's stern eyes scrutinized their bowed forms. Kurotsuchi could only hope Deidara wasn't in much trouble for not being here on time.

"We don't know where our teammate is, sir", she said, imagining that was what the man was wondering about. "Last time I saw him-"

"He is busy right now and I believe he won't be available for today", the Tsuchikage interrupted her, surprising them both. "Go to training ground three, Kurotsuchi, and follow the same routine you did while barred from active duty. You, boy, back on patrolling the borders for today. The two of you report back here with your colleague tomorrow."

While relieved that the Tsuchikage knew where Deidara was, she still wished he would share more information. Knowing better than to question, though, she voiced her assent and so did Issamu, and they both left the building.

Once away from the oppressive atmosphere, Issamu broke the silence as they walked together. "Do you know what happened to Deidara?"

Kurotsuchi almost said what happened yesterday. It was a twisting anxiety in her chest, and she just wanted to let it out, to tell someone about it.

But it wouldn't be appropriate to talk about something she still didn't understand well. That would only create speculation, and the last thing she wanted was for word to spread and only reaffirm most of the villager's belief that her nii-san was too dangerous a person.

"I have no idea. I was expecting him to be with us today, too."

Part of what she said was true, and he seemed to believe her. This day would be like the ones from when she was banned – long, strenuous training all day alongside other shinobi and under the supervision of jonin teachers. Deidara, being part of the Explosion Corps, rarely trained with them. Because of it, she almost didn't see him sometimes.

Issamu waved her goodbye and went to the village's gates, where he would be assigned a team and an area to survey. She waved back, with a weak smile. Sometimes he was overly serious, but he was a nice boy.

They were a good team, she thought as she reached the training ground and started to stretch. Her taijutsu was not impressive, but her affinity with the earth element was the path to become a very useful ninjutsu user. It was the village's specialty, and there was a lot to learn. Issamu had no affinity with any nature element, but was a very good close range fighter, and talented with genjutsu in a way she probably would never be. And Deidara was not only a proficient fighter, but also had the explosion release that increased his attack's destructiveness dramatically. All of his talent with ninjutsu and taijutsu made it funny to know that he was completely useless when it came to illusion techniques.

One of the instructors indicated Akatsuchi as her sparring partner, like before.

It must be hard for Deidara to be at the Explosion Corps, she thought, as she usually did when sparring with a friend. There was no one there close to his age and, from what little he told her, they didn't like him much. The discipline was stricter there than anywhere else, he was in the hospital much more frequently than her, and sometimes did extra missions that involved assassinations and demolition. She tried not to think about the first. They were in a shinobi village and hardships were routine; someday Issamu and her would go through the same. Deidara just had to do it first.

Late afternoon came, and she was dismissed. Going straight home for a good shower and maybe, afterwards, go buy some new clothes – the ones she wore right now were in a bad state – She suddenly saw a flash of a familiar shade of yellow in the corner of her vision.

There was the subject of her thoughts, walking away from what looked like the Kage office's direction. A quick look at his usual, bored expression and apparent good physical condition had her feeling excessively relieved. She smiled and ran towards him, not even caring she was bouncing every three steps like a little girl. He was well.

"Deidara-nii!"

His blue eyes widened a little. Then he smiled. It was not a wide, gleeful smile, but it was pleasant and, while she was not expecting it, it made her very happy.

The smile would become a punch if she hugged him, though, so Kurotsuchi took a wise step back, still looking up at him. "How are you?"

"I'm well, huh", he arched an eyebrow. "What with the question?"

What with the question? You looked like you were ready to go into a killing rampage yesterday, she wanted to say, but controlled herself. It would do no good to press on the subject. But still, it was impossible to ignore what happened completely.

"I… I mean, we, Issamu and I, were worried when you didn't appear today", she started, and then decided to let it all out, "And I also was very preoccupied after yesterday. You looked a little sick –" a little insane "- and I just left you there. But, I want you to be well. So you should know you can ask me anything, if you need help. Okay? Alright". She forced herself to shut up. That was a little corny, but it was true, no matter what he thought about it.

True enough, he was frowning, but his reaction wasn't what she expected.

"I'm better now. I was kinda ill yesterday, huh. It's got something to do with my chakra. So I was out today to find a solution and all's well now, yeah?"

Kurotsuchi blinked. Well, that sounded like the truth. She heard people talking about the blond having some chakra problem, but with all nonsense they usually spoke about him, she had dismissed the information as just one more false rumor.

"I'm glad. Do we see you tomorrow?"

"Yeah. Bye."

He calmly walked away and she went to her own home, considerably happier. Her fear of him sounded so silly now, and she even felt bad for it. Deidara just had a problem yesterday, today he got help, and tomorrow he would be better. Everything would be alright.

Chapter Text

Deidara entered his apartment, closed the door behind him, leaned on it and took a deep breath.

He was so confused.

This was a discovery that could – no, would – change his life.

For good or bad, though? When he was done reading the kinjutsu scroll, all he could think about was how this could be what he needed to finally, finally, as the scroll itself said – give life. Give life to his creations, and achieve that next level of greatness he didn't know even existed a few hours ago.

These past years, he would frequently think about his life, about what would become of him. He had a wish, a path he wanted to follow, but never knew where to start. He loved his art, but couldn't find a way to project it out of his mind and into reality. So he trained and fought and survived day after day reassuring himself that someday, soon, he would actively start his career as an artist, and that this routine imposed upon him was just temporary.

But time passed, days and weeks and years, and he suddenly saw himself incapable of advance, unmoving, and all evidence pointed to his living the rest of his life serving this village, and dying frustrated and disappointed, no more important than some random person whose existence made no difference for the world.

That couldn't happen.

He'd always been bitter, even if just a little, for being a ninja in this village. He'd had no choice – as soon as his bloodline limit was found, his fate was sealed. His attempts to explain that he didn't want to fight and where's mum and dad were laughed at and he was quickly sent, four years old, to the Explosion Corps, where he got treatment for his burns and was introduced to taijutsu and ninjutsu training. Now he could remember that was the first time he was called Deidara.

And every time he spent his entire day studying ways to defend himself or destroy someone, every time he almost got killed in a mission or trained so hard he would come home just to fall on his bed and sleep amongst torn clothes and drying blood, he begrudged the fact that the time he could be using to perfect his art was being spent away in the endless work that was defending the village and making it richer, and that any day he could die insignificant and forgotten, like those he disdained so much.

Yet now, in one of these rare moments he had to reflect seriously about his past and his destiny, he knew the truth. If he was to be an artist, he had to be a shinobi. There was no way to be the first and not the latter. What could he achieve as a civilian? His talent with sculptures would be the same, but would also stop there. It was obvious that molding was only one part of the creation, and there needed to be more. For all he knew, he could have been killed, anyways. Being a civilian wasn't secure when you lived in a hidden ninja village.

He also dreaded the thought of being weak. After seeing murders – and, in some cases, killing people himself – he knew that, in this world, those who truly valued their lives had to be strong.

A civilian would've never found this scroll, either.

So he could accept that things were the way they had to be. Even the explosive chakra he blamed as the distraction that ruined his artistic inspiration was, in the end, the means for it – for if he was an ordinary shinobi and found that scroll, he would have to live tormented forever, knowing that his dream was out of reach.

That is, if the kinjutsu did, in fact, work as he thought it should.

And this was the center of his conflict. He did trust his abilities as a fighter and a strategist… but not enough to believe he could steal the precious scroll without facing any consequences. It was below the freaking Tsuchikage's office, damn it. This village was full of powerful and very loyal fighters, and had no tolerance for traitors. A shudder ran through his spine when he thought of the fate of these few who tried to defy their Tsuchikage and his council.

If he were to steal the scroll, he had to be prepared to flee. This was not his first plan; he used to think he could become an artist and stay here. As long as he could develop his art, he didn't mind fighting for the village. This place was familiar, the local of his birth, and he was a Rock ninja. Could he risk this security, this place that was his identity?

Images of his comrades and teammates passed through his head. While not all of them were pleasant, they would fight alongside him, and, in some rare cases – well, maybe just in Kurotsuchi's case – they would risk their lives for him. And he sure didn't want the kid to die.

Could he leave everything behind, and be all by himself? Kami knew loneliness wouldn't be his only problem; the village would hunt him all the way to hell. They were as relentless with their missing nin as Kirigakure.

Maybe he should just forget about it, and stay here. He would keep the hard work and become one of strongest Rock nin. He knew he had the potential.

But with this thought came the certainty that he would never become an artist. If he wanted to reach such heights, he had to take risks, even those of life or death.

Could he abandon his comrades and the only way of life he knew in the name of art?

His eyes widened and his mouth contorted in a snarl. What kind of question was that?

Of course he would.

The need for bonds of friendship and camaraderie and the fear of the different were what made people insignificant, what made it impossible for them to reach their full potential and forced them to be puppets of the system. Furthermore, if he didn't act fast, someone would soon discover the kinjutsu and report its location to the Tsuchikage, like the well-conditioned, good little slaves they were.

Furious at himself for even contemplating the possibility of putting his art in second place for anything, he cleared his minds of any doubts and started to think.

That night was a sleepless one. Fortunately, a night without rest meant little for a seasoned ninja like him. And the excitement – and even a little fear – pumped him and wouldn't allow him to become tired.

It was early morning and the sky was still dark. Deidara walked in front of the Kage's office, discreetly glanced at it and kept walking west, as if the building wasn't the center of his agglomerated thoughts.

He wouldn't charge straight and detonate the guard's heads out of their shoulders, take the scroll and run like hell, no matter how tempting such a course of action was. He already knew the risk of getting caught was great, but if he ended dead, it would be because his awesome, well thought of plan was a failure, and not because he acted like an idiot.

He kept walking slowly. No one would read anything in his behavior; sometimes he would wake up at random times at night, in those rare moments when he wasn't exhausted from work, and take a stroll while the civilians were asleep, hoping for inspiration to strike.

The library was twenty meters underground, but there were long, twisted stairs one had to walk in order to reach it, tight passages that wouldn't allow someone to wield a big weapon or do any movements that required lots of space. It was quite claustrophobic for someone like him, who liked being outside in the open and hated restraints. And since it was underground, there were no windows – not even doors that lead somewhere else. The only way to get out was through the entrance.

Unless he blasted his way through the ground.

No! Stealth, stealth. He had to do it as inconspicuously as possible. Those horrible missions that involved a quiet job in the shadows had to be useful for something, and today he would apply what he learned.

He could bomb everything and everyone at his heart's content if he got caught, after all.

There were guards who worked in rotations. Usually only one in the entrance of the library, who had quick means to contact the other guards in the office – there would be three to four, he knew, since he once worked to protect the place, too. Normally he would just take the person down silently, but he knew there was a jutsu in place that would ring an alarm to any ninja in a hundred meter radius if any of the guards got unconscious. Nasty.

And then he paused at his destination – a building in a nicer part of the village. Nothing rich, but surely better than the place he lived on.

He should stop trying to complete his missions all by himself, people said. No man was an island, they said. Funny how he would only listen to his people's advice in order to betray them.

Knocking or even entering wouldn't do – unlike his own apartment, this one was mostly inhabited by ninja. So instead, he made the four hand seals that were combined in his group, in order to alert each other when they were needed. Only this time, it was aimed at only one person.

It was very quick. They were well trained, after all, and worked together for years. Very silently, his teammate slipped through the door and outside, already dressed in his ninja gear, his eyes more alert than one would expect so early.

"What is it?", Issamu asked, wiping his brown hair away from his face and adjusting his headband, so the wavy strands wouldn't bother him.

Deidara opened his mouth, and closed it, an uncharacteristic, unexpected hesitation taking over him. This was his friend – his annoying, stuck up, bossy but very loyal friend. And today, his career and life could end, if this plan continued in motion.

Issamu looked at his blond teammate. The boy was looking preoccupied and conflicted. How out of character for him.

But Deidara had used the communication technique that was reserved for emergencies, and it was still night, so he knew he had be alert.

"What is it?", he asked again, when Deidara looked hesitant, and that made Issamu tense, and mess with his short hair again. He almost snorted. He was acquiring his comrade's bad habits.

Deidara finally set his face into a stern and grave one, obviously gaining control over whatever emotions were running free in that head of his.

"Cast that jutsu that won't let us be overheard, huh. We've got a mission."

Issamu's eyes widened, and he cast a simple technique: an illusion of the two of them the way they were now, only they were in the civilian clothes they wore when they weren't in active duty, and their movements and expressions looked relaxed and carefree. For anyone who looked outside the five meter radius, it would look like they were just having a friendly conversation.

"Remember the spy who caused us so much trouble weeks ago?" Issamu was going to say that of course he did, but the blond kept talking in a rushed tone. "There is more than one. I don't know how much, but they're good, and they've already invaded the village and have substituted some of our sentinels as we speak."

"What?" Issamu looked at his bewildered friend. "That's impossible. We would know if any of our men were substituted like that. We…"

"They're good at what they do, I'm telling you! I have just been warned by Gari, and I know he's the real thing. No one can fake our bloodline limit, so at least we can trust the Corps. Now listen. They are here because they want a scroll that is below the Tsuchikage's office. We have to get it and protect it. It has our village's most important techniques. But we have no time, so let's go now!"

The brown haired boy allowed himself to calm down and fall into the cool and collected mind state he always did when in an important mission where he had to rationalize.

"There must be a mistake in your judgment. While spies are a true danger in this village, the idea that they would be capable of taking the place of numerous fighters without raising suspicions is ludicrous."

"But they did. We have been the targets of very powerful people for too long. They had time to plan. Let's go! I need you there."

"For what?"

"We can't distinguish friend from foe right now, so we'll have to target everyone there, and you know there's only one way to incapacitate the guards without raising the alarm. A technique I'm most incapable to perform."

With a frown, he turned around, while concentrating on not letting the illusion fall. "I know. But I just don't feel capable of fooling one of our village's security measures and the village's ninja with it. Listen-"

"No, no, you don't get it, do you? It's not like we can alert anyone. What if they were one of the invaders? They would call the others and everything would go to hell."

"Where is the Tsuchikage?"

"We can't reach him right now, huh! Let's go, or soon they will have the scroll, all because you were too slow!" Deidara was now talking too loudly, and it was a pain to keep it inside the barrier. He looked frustrated and angry. And, if Issamu were to be honest, so did he. But he wouldn't lose control.

And his busy mind was finding everything just too farfetched, too implausible. He never thought the village invulnerable like the youngest academy students did, but the thought that outsiders could suddenly enter the village, take lots of their people out – their most talented, since only the best would be guarding the Kage tower and the village's artifacts and scrolls - , substitute them while discarding the bodies who knows where and then silently take away their treasured knowledge was just too much for him to accept.

Dark eyes narrowed in suspicion. "This is nothing I've been through before. And where's Kurotsuchi? Shouldn't she be here, too?"

"Only the two of us are necessary for this, and it must be done quickly, damn it! It is our duty as the village's ninja, and in the situation we're in you know as well as I do there's no way to contact someone else without taking a risk. I already took one by coming here to see you."

Issamu's breath was accelerated, and he felt torn. Something – gut instincts, those anxious feelings that usually saved him from death - told him he shouldn't do this, at least not as the blond wanted him to. What if he was wrong, and they ended making the situation worse? What if he didn't know what he was talking about? What if…

"We are teammates", Deidara said, in a serious and sad voice that sounded very strange coming out of his lips. "You should trust me now."

Silence.

That made him focus. Trust.

And at that moment when he had to make a decision, and so quickly, he had an epiphany.

Perhaps his teammates weren't the source of their last failure, and the imperfect completion of missions. He had always put the blame on them, and saw himself as the group's main pillar, the one who would hold them all together and clean up his partners' mess.

But what if he was the weak link, after all? Rock was stern and strict, but a good teamwork was composed of faith, of being one with his comrades when in action. Even those who detested each other would cool down and fight together in order to survive and have success. Yet even after he learned to appreciate Deidara and Kurotsuchi for their abilities, he still saw them as nuisances when they wouldn't act as he wanted, as if his words only were the way to success.

Now he was being tested by the fates, and had to believe and follow, instead of forcing others to do things his way.

He looked up at his partner, his friend, and nodded, determined. He would change, and he would trust.

"Lead the way."

The two walked towards the Kage Office, Deidara ahead. "Two in front of the entrance, as you can see. More two on the end of the stairs", he said, with the knowledge he acquired on his first visit to the place. "The two inside are a bit harder to spot, but you can see through genjutsu as well as you can cast it, plus they're not specialists with illusions and just learned those because they were ordered to."

Issamu nodded at his side. The two were crouched right behind a corner, and covered by another of the brown haired boy's techniques, that made it look like there was nothing there but a dirty wall.

The plan was for his partner to cast his strongest genjutsu on every guard in the tower. There was an alarm that would flare if any of the guards fell unconscious or thought something was out of place, so the only way to get in was to trap them in an illusion that would make them believe there was nothing in front of them but a peaceful, silent night, even when the two boys walked right in front of them.

Deidara wondered how he had managed to convince his teammate of doing such thing. Requesting Issamu's help had been an impulse. On one side, he knew he would never be able to get the scroll without his help, but on the other, he never thought Issamu would believe in what he said. He thought everything was a lost cause when the boy started rationalizing why the situation was improbable, yet at the mention of something as abstract as friendship, Issamu let himself be guided by the blond.

Weird. He never thought Issamu would be the kind to go for sentimental pressure. Kurotsuchi would be the only one to break under it in the group, he thought. Oh, well. Better make good use of this one and only chance.

Issamu closed his eyes and made the hand seals, clearly concentrating so hard he wouldn't be able to think or react about anything else, and trusting the blond to guard his back. Deidara was worried. This was no easy feat to accomplish for a chunin, and if Issamu made a mistake, the two of them would be screwed.

Yet a few seconds after, he felt the release of a significant amount of chakra from the brunet boy's body, indicating the technique was in effect. The two guards, visible in front of the doors, stayed immobile, without a flinch, as they should. They wouldn't be seeing anything but the calm, deserted streets at night.

The two jumped down and made their way to the entrance. It was a tense moment, to just pass right in front of the very awake sentinels and through the door they were guarding, but they kept still and had attentive eyes at the illusion forged in front of their eyes. Deidara had to admire his teammate's abilities.

Running silently through the set of stairs he had memorized with Issamu in tow, he slowed when nearing a corner he knew the other two sentinels would be at, at made the combined signals to the boy at his back. Issamu closed his eyes and made the known signals once more. Deidara couldn't refrain from swallowing nervously. Issamu was already holding two people captive in his illusion; Capturing another two without losing grasp on the first ones would be very hard.

The new release of energy revealed the guards that were hidden by their own genjutsu. Issamu's technique didn't look like it bothered the now visible guards at all, showing that things were going as they should. Relieved, Deidara turned back to Issamu to tell him to wait, but what he saw made the worry come back. The boy had his head down, his hands frozen in the last hand seal, and looked tired and strained. He quickly opened his dark eyes and looked at the blond pointedly, trying to tell him to hurry up, before once more putting his head down.

There was no time to waste. Running fast but silently, he went past the two guards who looked past him, entranced by the image of a still, vacant corridor, intent on going down another set of stairs. The door was near, and he would soon be out of here.

He abruptly stopped when he felt something was wrong. His instincts screamed that in front of him was a dangerous path, and while every extra second he spent here put him closer to death, he knew better than to doubt the feelings he got from experience. Concentrating on feeling the chakra around him, he detected the pattern of an earth release jutsu.

A rumble and the stairs he came from were blocked by a sturdy wall that grew out of the floor. At the same time, he felt the ground move below him, and the walls, the floor and the roof started to slowly close in. It wasn't a trap he hadn't seen before, but the guards were in the closed space with him, and as soon as the shifting walls made their bodies move, they would startle out of the genjutsu and find him. Alarmed, he made two hand seals and called forth his normal chakra, hoping to stop the claustrophobic closing.

It was harder than he thought. While his affinity to earth was strong, there was no specific jutsu he knew of that could cancel the trap without waking up the sentinels, so he had to pour raw, imprecise energy around him and try to tell it what to do. It was very draining, and after fearing he would be worn out and then crushed with the two ninja besides him, the disturbing noise and movement stopped, and the roof went up, the floor was back down and the walls slowly shifted back to their places, leaving everything, inclusive the guards, as if nothing had happened.

Deidara cursed inwardly, feeling that more than half of his chakra reserves were wasted away. Were this another place, and if he didn't have to keep discreet while stealing the scroll, he would have simply blasted a hole and found his way out, or used a more effective, chakra conserving but very noisy jutsu that would force the room back to place.

Hoping dearly there would not be a second trap like that one – if there were, he would be forced to use his explosive chakra, that was almost at its maximum and was more powerful, but would seal his fate, for anyone would be able to tell it was him – he went down more steps, entered the library and quickly lit one of the lamps, trying to control his unease. He went directly to the familiar scroll which was thankfully on the same place and position he left it at. The great relief took away a weight from his shoulders. If someone had noticed and taken away the scroll, all this effort would be for naught. Issamu's unknown sacrifice would, too.

Forcing down the annoying emotion he could admit was remorse, he extended his hand carefully.

And, thanks to this carefulness, the blond was able to avoid the worst of a burst of lethal water that came out of the scroll. With wide eyes, he watched the trap that was put inside his prize. It obviously wasn't there before. Did someone discover about him?

The water materialized in what were bigger versions of piranhas with oversized teeth. Who in the village would know such a technique? Deidara wanted to flee, but knew that, as the jutsu's target, he would just get followed and attract attention. He needed to get rid of them now.

The creatures attacked and were too fast for him to properly avoid. Teeth that were far too hard and pointy for creatures made of water injured his skin, and one particularly nasty bite almost took his right hand off. Swearing, he knew he had no other choice but to attack back with the earth element, no matter how much damage that would do to his halved reserves.

"Earth Release: Earth Corridor!"

The ground molded and moved according to his wishes, creating a prison with no spaces to escape through and crushing the trap's jutsu. The shock of different chakra natures nullified both techniques, and earth and water fell down, lifeless, into a big puddle of thick mud.

The remaining creatures that escaped the prison were too weakly charged to attack by themselves, and fell struggling to the floor, before dissolving into still, harmless water.

Ripping off his long sleeve, he used it to cover the gash at his pulse, trying to make the fabric stay as firm as possible, so his blood would stop falling down.

And then, all of a sudden, Deidara didn't feel as sure of his plan as before. He had known there was a possibility that things could go wrong, but actually living through the possible failure and capture was another thing altogether. There was no way the village's ninja wouldn't be alert by now, and already coming this way.

Taking the real scroll – he opened it very carefully to verify and put it in one of his trousers' pockets – He looked down at his blood, sprawled over the now damp, irregular, messy floor. Not knowing of a better way of cleaning it up – it wouldn't do to leave such obvious evidence of his guilt, no matter how dead he already was since the stupid water jutsu caught him – Deidara summoned even more of his regular chakra, forcing the damaged part of the floor to open and turn itself inside out, swallowing his blood and the remaining water.

Once more he cursed, now desperate. His chakra level was so low he would probably be able to perform only one more technique before getting dangerously close to complete exhaustion, so much he had drained of it. It was only his explosive chakra, mostly unused and demanding attention, that kept him alert and going. In a few hours – maybe even a few minutes – he could be facing torture and public execution. And to think he thought so little of it before when everything was alright, as if he could pay such a price in order to have this scroll. Right now, his resolution didn't feel as clever as it once did.

But now, there was no choice but to flee. Running away from the room, any care for stealth gone, he found the two guards still immobile. That was surprising. He thought Issamu would have left by now, or at least wouldn't be able to hold them for so long.

Running up the stairs, he found the brunet holding firm, but looking sick. His limbs trembled, and it looked like it was a huge effort to keep his hands and fingers closed in the right seal, let alone stay up. His breath was harsh and his eyes were closed tight, but as Deidara neared his teammate, the boy opened his eyes, with a startled expression.

"D-Deidara…" he wheezed, as if asking for permission to release the jutsu and get out of there. Without telling him anything, the blond kept running to the exit. As soon as he started on the spiraling stairs, he heard the boy behind him let out a pained gasp, and the almost imperceptible chakra in the air disappeared abruptly, letting him know the four guards under genjutsu would be free.

Now truly running for his life, the steps felt like they would never end. Was this a trick? Was he already caught under some Rock ninja's genjutsu, and they were playing with him before throwing him to the torturers? As a blessing and a great mercy, he saw the moonlight coming from the entrance. His legs were burning and he was exhausted, but he ran towards the natural light and the fresh air, wanting to get out of the place that felt much more constricting than it did when he entered it.

Stopping at the last moment, he hid back behind the last corner that would take to the underground's front door. His breath accelerated, he knew he hadn't been hiding well at all, but he knew that the two guards out there would be awake, and they would be either waiting for him, or they would enter and search. There was no way they'd suddenly disappear.

As if listening to his thoughts, it looked like they grew impatient and decided to enter. They were capable ninja and wouldn't be loud, but the very faint noises that Deidara could barely hear sounded worse than an uproar to his panicky mind.

A chuckle left him. This wasn't exactly the emotion he wanted to live, but it was still a break from the routine he'd been through lately. If he could use his explosive chakra… for every time he lamented his low reserves of energy, his bloodline would practically scream at him to be freed. Perhaps, if he had nothing to lose, he would use it. His dilemma would end – he would stop being the prey and become the predator, turn to where his pursuers were coming from and blast them to the other life, then destroy this whole thing and anyone who stayed on his way.

Ah… if only.

But he had something precious to him now, the scroll that his senses were acutely aware of, with the instructions that could lift him up to a new level of artistry.

And this thought fueled him. He was hurt, but still well. His body was in a great condition, if one forgot about his hurt hand, and that was nothing to someone like him. His normal chakra could be at its end, but his bloodline limit, his dear, beloved technique was ready to maim and destroy at his whim. He really didn't want to use it for there was still a very, very small chance he could escape from there without being discovered, and leaving any traces of his explosion techniques would ruin him. Still, if things turned too bad, he knew he wouldn't go down without a great fight.

And as he ran down, while thinking about a new plan – he had to get back up, and not down, after all – he found a very tired looking boy climbing the stairs in desperate but slow and inconsistent motions.

Issamu looked up at him with his brow furrowed and confused eyes, as if he still didn't understand what was happening. And he uses to call Kurotsuchi and I fools. But as these thoughts crossed his mind, he felt, once more, the horrible feeling of guilt, making him feel all knotted up on the inside. It was worse because he wasn't used to it, so it hurt so much more.

But the art was stronger.

It would always be.

And so, he turned his back to Issamu and stared at the stairs and at the guards who were going to come from in a few seconds. Tying his hair up in a tight bun, he took out the fabric he had prepared and quickly covered his hair and face with the made up mask, leaving only his eyes visible.

Here he was, planning to fight against jonin level shinobi without using his bloodline limit. It was ridiculous, but he could only hope.

As the two ninja appeared, they seemed to hesitate when they saw Deidara's attire, that was the standard Rock uniform, but his covered face was enough to make him guilty in their eyes. As they prepared to fight, the blond tried to recognize who they were and if they fought together before, so he could have an idea of what techniques they would use.

But as their faces became visible – the light there was low – Deidara recognized them as young teenagers who were just made chunin. They were older than him, but not remarkably strong in any way, and he was confused. Was this the security the Tsuchikage provided for the village's important documents? He could clearly remember the guards here were of a much higher level. Something was very wrong.

But they were still blocking his way out. Hoping these boys of mediocre abilities wouldn't recognize him, he attacked the one who came closer and was halfway in performing an earth technique – a simple one, but Deidara was in no condition to raise a shield to protect himself. Breaking the boy's seals sequence and avoiding the consequent physical attacks, he drew back his fist, and had to consciously hold his explosive chakra down. Hitting his enemy with all the force he could muster, he heard a crack in the boys' head, but also felt pain from his now damaged left hand. Using taijutsu without the aid of his explosions was hard.

Still, he was faster and stronger than this teenager who was taller but never had to go through the physical training routine of the Corps. A few more attacks the older boy couldn't avoid made sure he fell unconscious.

The young man left looked hesitant. It was understandable. Less than two months ago, this guy was just a genin, and was obviously late in getting his promotion. He let his partner fight by himself and now was left alone with Deidara who was practically half his size, but obviously more capable. It was no wonder he looked doubtful about advancing.

Knowing his time was short, Deidara ran towards him and made the first strike. He though just charging ahead would be enough with this guy, and was surprised when he dodged quite well and they circled each other, changing positions, Deidara now closer to the entrance and the other Rock nin deeper inside the corridor. His frustrated look showed he realized his mistake, but Deidara knew he had to get rid of him before fleeing. Thinking about the best way of doing so, he saw his opponent was holding up a bloodied kunai. Startled, he looked down and saw a gash in his leg, that was starting to bleed.

Yet again, he paid the price of underestimating his opponent. He left himself too open, thinking a guy who had barely made it to chunin wouldn't be able to hit him, and now had to deal with yet another bloody wound.

Needing to take this guy out of the game but knowing there was no way to fight for long without leaving quite a trail of blood, Deidara decided to use a medical technique to end the troublesome battle. He always had good chakra control, and this one required only a quick pulse. If he did it right, the young man would fall unconscious for longer than one usually would after receiving a strike to the back of the neck.

Engaging once again in physical combat, a few seconds were all he needed before he found an opening and tried, for the first time, to perform the technique he read only once about. Surely it was simple, and that would be enough?

The pulse was calculated and did exactly what Deidara ordered it to, yet the young guard's loud scream, that was interrupted by a sudden and strong hemorrhage from his ears, mouth, nose and eyes, followed by his body collapsing on the floor with violent seizures, reminded Deidara that he was no medic nin.

But it took care of the boy, and that's what mattered.

He made his way to the entrance faster than he thought he could. Once outside, the blond quickly turned back to look at the door, and started two earth element hand seals, no matter how much his already weakened chakra reserves protested. If he could do this right, there would be a chance.

Just as he was almost finished, Issamu appeared through the corner. How he managed to get there so fast in such a state he didn't know. It must have been out of desperation. The energy that fueled the boy must have left him though, as he fell to his hands and knees a few meters before the door that would lead outside. He still managed to look up at Deidara, his dark, disturbed eyes looking up at him through messy hair bangs, and there finally was some comprehension in his gaze, as if he realized he had been betrayed. Hurried steps and the sound of weapons hitting the narrow corridor could be heard behind him from the dark passage. The guards from inside must have reached them. Still, Issamu looked at him with something akin to a pleading, as if there was some chance the blond would stop whatever he was doing and retrieve him.

"Earth Release: Earth-Style Wall!"

With a unreadable expression, the same the brown haired boy used to wear when immersed in thought, Deidara spent the last of his chakra and the jutsu sealed the entrance shut, giving the blond only a few seconds to watch the guards caught up with his teammate and grab him roughly, hitting his head on the ground with a sickening crunch, and then silence.

And as he ran through the streets he knew so well, sometimes in the open, and sometimes through hidden passageways – the morning sun rays were starting to appear, and he could be seen, after all – he wondered what he should do, now. No one had seen him, and until now, he hadn't found a single ninja in his way. If he did, he would have to use his explosion release, for his normal chakra would now take days to recover, and then that would be the end of his chance of not being discovered as the perpetrator. Realizing that having his face covered on dark cloth would emphasize his crime, he freed himself of it and tied it around his leg wound. His battered appearance and the torn sleeve would give him away to other ninja, but civilians would think nothing of it. Beaten fighters limping around the village were nothing new.

He made the known way back home, wondering about how strange it was that things were going so well – he was alive and that was already too good considering the circumstances.

---

Deidara closed the door behind him quietly and locked it.

And fell face first on the floor.

Alarmed, he tried to get up, but a strong wave of dizziness kept him bent down. Holding himself still, he waited until the room stopped spinning – at least a little – and got up on weak legs, breathing quickly through his mouth.

Now that the adrenaline was gone and he was back to a familiar and safe place – or maybe not so safe, but being at his apartment did give him a small sense of security inside – there was nothing else to drive him and keep him alert and awake. He had never drained his chakra like this before – only the explosive one, since he almost always used his bloodline limit to fight. It looked like the complaints by normal people about how terrible it was to feel completely drained had some base. He made the right decision not to leave the village, then. In such a state, he would just faint near the gates. All of this, for the scroll.

He picked it from his pocket. It was still there – he had been very aware of it during his little "mission" – but he still wanted to have assurance that he was successful. Opening it, he found the same introduction he had practically memorized from the first time he saw it and, below it, he would find all the knowledge he wanted. Maybe now…

The exhaustion caught up with the blond and everything went black.

---

Kurotsuchi shifted her body's weight from one foot to the other and took a deep breath to calm herself. It wouldn't do to show such nervousness in front of other people. Her grandfather, particularly, would criticize her for it.

Still, similar to yesterday, she was worried and impatiently waited for some enlightenment for the situation she was in – only now it was worse, for she didn't know what happened to her two teammates.

After waking up early and dressing up, she went to the ninja academy. In front of it there were some benches, shadowed by short trees. It was the usual spot they would meet at when they didn't have to report to the Tsuchikage before doing the day's work.

After waiting for an hour, she knew something was very wrong.

To be honest, she started getting preoccupied after they were five minutes late. Punctual Issamu would never be late without a reason. But she kept waiting – maybe Deidara would come soon.

When she realized no one was coming, she went to the Kage Office. Her impulse was to search for her friends in their respective homes, but surely they wouldn't be lazing around when they all had an assignment, and she couldn't waste time searching for them. Maybe her grandfather would know what happened, since he knew about Deidara's whereabouts yesterday.

She came to find the office interdicted, with some high ranking shinobi around it, some analyzing the place, some hurriedly running from a place to the other. They wouldn't let her pass, but she could gather from the conversation that someone had invaded the office this night.

So there she stayed, waiting for another hour, until she saw the Tsuchikage coming out.

Knowing she wasn't wanted there but too anxious about Deidara's and Issamu's wellbeing to care about being improper, she ran up to him, avoiding the local guard who tried to stop her.

"Grandfa – Tsuchikage-sama!" she said as soon as she was on his hearing range. He turned to her with a frown.

"Kurotsuchi? What are you doing here?"

"My teammates… I can't find them anywhere!"

"I don't have the time for that now. Go search for them yourself."

"But – they are nowhere to be found!" She didn't mention the fact that she hadn't actually searched for them around the village. "This breaking in the office… were they involved in the conflict?"

"The investigations are being done. We will know everything about what happened soon", a villager from the intelligence office said, looking down at her through his spectacles as if she was an annoying bug. "Now, if you will excuse us…"

She looked at her grandfather with a dejected air. His expression relaxed a little, probably because of her obviously distraught emotional state.

"Deidara is well, Kurotsuchi", he said, surprising her, and then added in a low voice, "and that other boy… you don't need to worry about him."

Somehow, even knowing that her grandfather knew something about her friends' state didn't make her feel much better. Kurotsuchi didn't miss the fact that the Tsuchikage didn't mention anything about Issamu's wellbeing. No need to worry about him? How so? And didn't he tell her to search for them before she pressed for information? As if sensing the barrage of questions at the tip of her tongue, the powerful old man sent her a forbidding glare, and she knew he lost his patience with her, and let him go back to work.

She then shrieked and pulled at her hair furiously, deciding to go searching for the boys. When she found these two, she would somehow put them under a tracking jutsu as to know where and how the two were at all times, whether they liked it or not.

---

Sitting with his hair unbound and his legs crossed on his bed with the scroll wide open in his lap, the boy read slowly and with attention what he had only taken a quick glance at before. The scroll was very technical and he would have to research the meaning behind a term or two, but he could understand most of it.

It was night and, from the looks of it, he had slept the whole day. His normal chakra was barely restoring but at least he felt mentally and physically better after such a long rest. Munching in another apple, he handled the paper carefully.

The focus of the scroll was in infusing objects with chakra, as he had gathered before, but it sounded much more complicated now that he had time to look at it.

First was the theory: the village was preoccupied with the ninja who had the explosion release, because setting explosions so near one's self was very dangerous, and they were losing precious fighters. He had to agree – few had abundant control over the chakra, and many in the Explosion Corps were scarred by the results of the kekkei genkai's violent damage. Some even ended up crippled or dead. Deidara was very lucky for not having any scars but those he got when Issamu kicked him in what felt like such a long time ago and he lost control of the landmine fist, and they were already fading.

With such a danger in mind, the researchers looked for a way to set the explosions far away from the user, by allowing them to leave explosive traps and set them from far away, as one would with explosive tags.

As the scroll dwelled on the numerous experiments and the successes and failures, he decided to skip the section that was more history than anything practical.

Once the user has adapted his chakra to this new mobility, he will be capable of infusing the object in question with his chakra simply by having physical contact with it. Take as an example the rock that was used on experiment G-5. When calling up the chakra as one would when wishing to create an explosion with their hands, they now have the option of just inserting the energy inside the object, instead of destroying it. The user will become aware of the chakra in the rock, and can leave it hidden anywhere, or even fling it at an opponent. G-5 volunteer Haruo Imaizumi reports that he could sense the rock's location as if it were a part of himself and, by using the ram hand seal, the rock would explode with a strength as great as it would be if he had set the explosion directly from his hands. Other tests were performed to confirm this. Be noted the usefulness of this jutsu not only to securely use the bloodline limit, but also as a means to track an opponent that unknowingly carries the infused object. There is, however, a distance limit between user and object before the chakra on the latter dissipates.

While it was not exactly what he was looking for, that was still damn useful. He wanted to see his enemies' expressions when he shot them a kunai and then had it explode at their faces.

Not that he could do it if he didn't want his stealing of the scroll to be discovered. Oh, bother.

Deidara kept reading, knowing there was much more.

The second option is much more innovative and will require advanced control and other requirement(s) that we weren't as of yet been able to identify, for only part of the test volunteers were able to come with favorable results. By inserting the object inside the user's body, he becomes able to perform an advanced infusion that increases the power and resourcefulness of the technique.

Insert it on his body? The hell, would he have to eat it or what?

This new infusion takes a considerably longer time and the user must have greater chakra reserves and stamina. When finished, he will be able to control remotely the movements of said object, like giving life to unmoving things. That is why it is recommended to use an object that is capable of being moved around, similar to a doll or something that resembles an animal, insect or alive creature – or anything with legs capable of carrying the whole weight around. Volunteer Kazuko Aoki reported having a greater perception about the 30 cm wooden puppet while it was infused with her chakra, and, in an extraordinary discovery, of also being able to feel and understand, if in a limited way, its surroundings. The explosion destroyed a 14,76m range, three times more than she would have usually achieved with the same amount of chakra if the explosion had been let out directly out of her body. Next volunteer –

Deidara yelped. So immersed he was in the reading, he kept eating the apple until it was finished and then he proceeded to bite the fingers holding it.

Cursing at his idiocy, but still incapable of holding back the gleeful smile on his face, he went back to where he stopped.

Next volunteers were incapable of sensing the object's surroundings like Aoki, and were capable of creating explosions of varied ranges, the greatest one of a 55m range that destroyed the objects in the area and drained the user of his chakra. Experiment K-2 has every result detailed.

The scroll was indeed extensive, but he made himself read everything, even the smallest speculations, before jumping to action.

The instructions required a Fūinjutsu circle and an extensive amount of hand seals. Deidara practiced the sequence numerous times, careful not to actually use any chakra while doing so, until he had it all memorized. Quickly moving the furniture to a corner, he took a brush and some paint – part of the standard ninja set, even though he hardly used it until now – and started drawing on the floor, noticing how his small apartment could barely contain it. When done, he checked it numerous times.

To be honest, he was quite afraid of doing some irreparable damage to his body or chakra, and wondered what would be sealed by the Fūinjutsu. But it wasn't like he could go to the village's specialists for help, and the scroll listed numerous experiments that were done until they managed to elaborate the right way to perform the kinjutsu.

Steeling himself, he closed the scroll and put it inside a box in the bathroom, so it wouldn't be damaged if something went wrong with the jutsu. Placing himself inside the circle in the correct position – sitting over his bent legs, positioning his hands between his legs in the first seal, the snake, and bending his back while looking down – looking like a devoted prayer, and considering how he was wishing so hard that this would work, the position was appropriate – he took a deep breath and started the sequence.

Forty two seals, but he had a good memory. There was no need to hurry, so he made them in a moderate but sure pace. The ink lines were activated and shining and he could feel the chakra from his bloodline limit fueling them. After finishing the first half, he could feel his pathways tingling, and became very aware of the room as his energy coated it. For a moment, he worried about the prudency – or lack of it – of doing such an attention calling ritual in his apartment. Shoving those concerns to the back of his mind, for now it was too late to have any regrets, he finished the last seals, and grew worried as his chakra poured, more and more, outside his body and in the circle. Was it not enough? Would it suck him dry? He had an impression that the failure of such a massive ritual would have worse consequences than simple chakra exhaustion.

Gasping in fear as the last of what he had left his body and he felt terribly empty, he had just two seconds to start regretting the whole procedure before it all came back to his core violently fast, shocking him out of his position and sending him to the floor, convulsing in seizures and an exquisite and strong feeling that was almost like pain, but not quite.

Deidara lay there for what felt like a short time, but he knew was longer from the clock that had fallen to the floor and accused that almost three hours had passed. Getting up weakly, he looked around himself. Everything was very silent, and the lights had turned off. He tried to turn them on, but the light bulb wouldn't light up. Lighting a candle, he could see the circle and the symbols were still there, but the paint was fading and the whole composition was powerless.

Had it worked? Something had to have happened, for the procedure was surely quite the spectacle. He looked down at his hands. The blond didn't feel different in any way. Both his normal chakra and the explosion release one felt normal, his bloodline limit's energy just a little bit spent.

With a mixture of excitement and worry, he went to the bathroom and picked up the scroll. As it was too dark inside, he lighted half the candles he could find in the drawer and scattered them around the room. With all of those candles and the circle, his room looked quite macabre, as if he was trying to summon a demon, and he couldn't avoid thinking about what Kurotsuchi's reaction would be if she decided to visit him right now. Snorting at the thought, Deidara sit back on the back and read the instructions once more, even though he already did so twice.

Grabbing some of his clay – he sure didn't want to try to create art with a stupid rock, for Kami's sake – he started molding a creature with both his hands, hurriedly. In only one minute, he had a perfect looking snake, with the size of a garden one, coiled into itself as if sleeping. The scroll only said it would be instinctive, and that he should call his chakra as if he was going to create an explosion.

Concentrating on doing the already very well know procedure, he made sure not to actually explode the thing. With his eyes closed, he wondered about what he should do now – the energy would refuse to go back to his body now, it would demand to be released – when, to his astonishment, he felt his chakra slowly penetrating the small and warm sculpture. Holding still as not to disturb the process, he realized it was almost automatic, and all of the chakra he had concentrated at his palms left his hands until they were in the object.

It was weird, to say the least. He poked the creature, and could almost feel it. He didn't use much chakra – it would be insane to set a big explosion inside his room – and then he got up and carefully left the little snake inside one of his flak jackets, that was turned inside out. They were very resistant to damage, and would stand a small explosion.

Still aware of his chakra that was ready to detonate but, this time, was a few meters away from him, he ordered it to release, as he would if it were in his hands.

The small 'bang' made the jacket jump a little. He ran to it and turned it upside down, letting the white dust that was his small serpent fall to the floor and form a small cloud before settling.

He did it.

Now what was that about making things move, again?

Half an hour of re-reading later, and a small bird, more carefully crafted than the snake of before, rested on his palm. The scroll said that Aoki woman controlled a thirty centimeter tall puppet, and he shuddered when thinking about how she had put that thing inside the body. The easiest form of fitting the requirement was putting the object inside his mouth, and he did so, inserting the white bird inside his mouth and closing it. He called the explosive chakra to his mouth – and was ridiculously worried about doing so, since explosion release tended to, well, explode when called. Trying to ignore the mental image of what would happen to his face if such a thing happened, he willed the chakra to penetrate the clay, but felt it only washing over it. Not wanting to take the figurine out and try again, he used his tongue to carefully contour the bird's structure, feeling the chakra was now being infused better. Feeling he was done, he spitted his creation into his hand, and stared at it.

The bird didn't take well to the rough treatment of Deidara's tongue. Most of the details that made it look more real had partially melted, one wing was glued to the body, a tiny foot was deformed and there was only a stub left… it looked like something a child – an untalented one – would make while playing.

And then it moved.

Deidara didn't know if it was of its own accord or because its creator wanted it to, but it moved in his hand. That startled the blond, even though he knew he should have expected it – it was his objective, after all.

Still, it was shocking to see it actually happen. It was nothing pretty – the creature was deformed, after all, and would limp in its imperfect feet, and try to fly with only one working wing and end up falling to a side and struggling, like the deformed baby of some animal.

Still, at Deidara's eyes, it was the most fascinating of his creations, until now.

It didn't move the way the blond wanted it to because it was not physically capable of, so Deidara mentally ordered it to stay still, as one would order their chakra to work in a certain way to perform a jutsu.

After a little more observing, he put it on the floor a few meters away from him. He willed it to explode, but nothing happened. Remembering the book recommended the use of a seal to better command the thing. Knowing that, for the release of an already built technique, a seal was just the key that would give it strength, he decided he wanted to do it his own way, instead of using seals he used for other jutsu. Forming the confrontation one, he murmured the word those monks would scream at him when he would lose his concentration in one of his useless psychological appointments.

"Katsu!" and it sounded like an exclamation, while still in a low voice.

And the bird exploded.

Hard.

The onslaught of heat and power was much bigger than he expected, and the bird being only a few meters away from him, the explosion's force pushed him sprawled to the ground, and left a sizable hole on the floor.

A woman screamed from the apartment below his, and he could hear her crying and running away from her house. The only thing he could think about, however, was about how lucky he was he decided to use a small part of his chakra, or he would be seriously hurt, or make the already weak building fall down.

The various possibilities running wild in his mind, he went back to work with a smile so wide it hurt his cheeks.

---

It was already midday, and Deidara saw himself forced back to reality. He had skipped one day and a half of work and while he thought what he was doing was much more productive than border patrolling, the last thing he wanted was for someone to come knocking on his door.

Not to mention, what had happened about his break into the underground library? Surely it must have caused quite a commotion, and investigations must have started in the place.

Reality was harsh, but if he was to at least try to stay unsuspected, he had to report to the Tsuchikage with an excuse.

It was incredibly hard to get out of his apartment and on the streets. To his paranoid mind, it was as if every person at the street who looked at him was doing so because they suspected him of the crime. It didn't help that he was followed by the stares of the civilians he shared the apartment with. They were obviously resentful of his explosion and while he had always been a noisy neighbor, they never saw him creating a hole through the cement. Still, each of them lowered their eyes when he stared back.

Civilian and ninja looked troubled and anxious and only talked about this new breakup that was a painful reminder of the mysterious spy that had been walking freely around the Rock Village.

Forcing himself to focus as soon as he got closer to the office, for looking scared would be a dead giveaway, he passed in front of the door that led to the underground library – changed because his earth release had crushed the previous one, and now two jonin guards stood watch in front of it – and sent the whole scenery a surprised look, as if he weren't the one responsible for it. Telling himself over and over that if they even suspected it could have been him, he would already be under painful questioning or at the very least restrained, he went to the door to the Kage's enormous room and knocked twice.

"Enter".

He doesn't know. He doesn't know.

With a slightly troubled expression – he didn't present himself to work for one whole day and a half, after all, and that would explain it – Deidara opened the door and got down on one knee, bowing his head in a display of obedience. It helped that he didn't have to look his leader, whom he betrayed, in the eye while in this position.

"Speak."

"I have been absent from my duties in the past two days", he started.

"So I heard." The voice was impatient and cynical, but that was normal.

"My chakra… has been getting harder to control", he relayed the story he decided to tell. At first, he wanted something more carefully elaborated, but an excuse that was too perfect and sounded like a creation from his mind could end it all. "My research in the library had no results besides teaching me an useful technique or two." Oh, if he only knew. "I wanted to go to the Explosion Corps and see if there was a way to release some of my chakra, but I lost control of it last night and ended blasting a hole in my apartment."

Silence. And then, "Someday I will have to take those poor civilians away from you, as a charity. I can only imagine what they have to go through with such a troublesome neighbor. Look at me!"

Deidara looked up and finally took the man's appearance in. He was stressed and red on the face, his eyes even harder than usual, but that was to be expected. Such a breach in security would cause a scandal among civilian and shinobi, and lower the Rock Village's reputation as soon as the story became known to the rest of the world.

And he was the one who caused it. He didn't regret it, no – but it would be nice if his treachery didn't have such consequences.

"You do understand I cannot simply let you back down there. Did you hear about what happened?"

"Someone broke in to get something, huh. But that's all I can know for sure. The rumors have the most varied versions and some are ridiculous." So, his paranoid state that made him listen to almost every little word people in the village were saying about the village was useful, after all. "But I wouldn't get anything by going back there, sir. I already researched all I could, and found nothing but a couple of jutsu."

There was a long silence, and Deidara kept looking directly at his teacher's eyes. This was very unnerving. The man was usually straight to the point and then, get-out-of-my-office.

"Are you sure there was nothing?" Oonoki said, breaking the oppressive silence. "Didn't you learn any new… special technique? None at all?"

His voice was unusually calm, as the voice of a father or a patient teacher who was trying to talk to a small child.

"There were some, yeah. Like the Explosive Palm. I like that one, I never saw my bloodline limit as a means for defense. And some healing stuff too, but I already know these." Please, please, please, buy it.

"That's good to know. It's not like anyone without your bloodline limit would find anything useful in that section. And if I can't trust my own apprentice with access to the village's techniques, then who can I trust?"

The blond felt himself freeze in the inside. Was that a game? Would the Tsuchikage drop it now and call the guards? His face, by some miracle, still held the same attentive and bored expression, as he usually would when someone started mentioning trust and friends and anything of the like.

"Hmm. Yeah, that's right."

The Tsuchikage sent him a knowing smile, a very small one but it looked scandalous on the usually frowning, severe face. "Go search for Kurotsuchi, Deidara, and the two of you come back here. I will call Akatsuchi; he will be the third member of your group and will know what to do."

Deidara almost answered with a 'yeah'. Almost. "What about Issamu, huh?" shit, he almost forgot to ask about him.

"The boy has a special assignment and you probably won't be seeing him for a while. Now, out with you. I've got work to do."

"Yes, Tsuchikage-sama."

And it took a lot of self-control to get out of the office in a moderate pace, instead of just jumping out through some window, like he wanted to. Did the man know? Did anyone? He was sure the Tsuchikage had set numerous traps in which he could fall by saying the wrong words, as soon as he entered that office.

---

Oonoki let the friendly expression fall, and looked at the closed door with furrowed brows.

Deidara was more than he expected. The boy had held his composure quite well, and even acted the way he would in an ordinary day.

His apprentice also did quite well on stealing that scroll.

Of course, the boy had needed some help. Had the guards been the same as usual, Deidara wouldn't have stood a chance. It was quite imprudent of the boy, to break in like that, just with the help of his also chunin friend – former friend, actually – especially since he thought the scroll would be guarded by jonin-level shinobi.

But he would cure that thoughtlessness and make an useful asset for the village out of the rash blonde whose abilities would have to be growing considerably since yesterday.

The boy should be very grateful. Anyone else would have faced the death penalty by now.

Chapter Text

Two weeks later

Surprisingly enough, Deidara still resided in Rock Village – and it was not even in a prison.

The team was now composed by Kurotsuchi, Akatsuchi and himself. They were informed of this new setting when they met right after Deidara's encounter with the Tsuchikage. The girl was truly distraught, and Deidara's assurances that Oonoki said Issamu was on a mission didn't make her feel better at all. Realizing that she was right and things weren't looking too well for the absent boy, Akatsuchi tried to comfort both her and Deidara, even tough he didn't know Issamu very well and only talked once or twice to him.

Deidara liked to think his sad expression whenever they talked about Issamu was a very well done façade that would fool both his comrades. Yet, the truly uncomfortable feelings that would surge inside forced him to admit the display was not as forced as he would hope.

But regret, ah, no. It would never be regret. Throwing Issamu to the wolves had been the unhappy but necessary price he had been willing to pay in exchange for the precious document that still served as a guide to him.

The blond chunin walked down the rocky path leisurely, his free hands swinging at his sides. That was very rare for him, for his hands usually were always kept molding, crushing, or even just shoved inside his pockets, but never relaxed as they were now. But with the taxing pressure of his uncontrolled chakra now gone, he could comfortably walk around with his hands unrestricted.

Looking ahead, he saw his "enemy" gazing back at him with apprehension. Grunting, Deidara used a single hand seal to perform a jutsu that made the ground below the creature cave in, so it was trapped in a deep hole.

He looked down at the brown bear from above and sniffed indignantly, not for the first time these past weeks. Lately they had been assigned to such low missions.

Wild animals appearing around the Rock Village weren't uncommon at all, and ninja would often be sent to kill or at least drive them away. It was important for the main paths to remain secure for the travelling civilians, specially merchants. Of course, such duties were more suited to recently graduated genin, and not a team of chunin composed by shinobi who were used to missions of higher ranking.

Akatsuchi approached, jumping from the nearest cliff.

"I think that was the last one, Deidara," he said, as Kurotsuchi came from the opposite side, nodding her agreement.

"Good. Let's go back to the office and report," the big boy said and turned around, while Akatsuchi and Deidara followed behind.

"Can't stand these stupid 'missions' anymore, huh," Deidara grumbled yet again, as he did every day for the past two weeks. "Did the old man demote us and forgot to tell or what?"

The small girl by his side huffed and kicked angrily at a rock, looking like she would rather kick him. "All you do is complain and complain! Shut up just for a while!"

Deidara turned at her sharply, wanting to give a nasty answer, but decided to stay silent. This was hardly surprising. Kurotsuchi's initial melancholy had quickly turned into anger that was triggered by the smallest offence or even nothing at all.

Akatsuchi, always the peace-maker, had to intervene. "Let's understand Deidara's point of view, Kurotsuchi. These tasks are indeed below our level. Maybe the village is not having many requests of higher ranking missions lately. We should enjoy the break while we can," he ended, now looking at Deidara.

The blond nodded, just to end the discussion. Rock was in the same high demand as it had always been. Yet, he could still remember the first assignment they got after he stole from the library. Finding some rich civilian's lost ring. And everything went downhill from there, their group reliving their genin days by doing a variety of the most minor errands and then being sent home.

Akatsuchi thought this was the Tsuchikage's way of giving them some rest in consideration of Issamu's vanishing. Deidara doubted that very much, but didn't express his opinion. This odd state of affairs was not restricted only to their team business. The Explosion Corps had been strangely lenient with him lately. His instructors were the same overbearing bastards of always, but his presence was requested in less frequency than before. Actually, his work there was reduced to three times a week.

The Tsuchikage had not called him to train in a long time, too. While the man was too busy to have regular meetings with his apprentice, Deidara was used to being called sporadically so he could show his improvement, spar and learn something his instructors could not teach. Nevertheless, they hadn't had such encounters ever since… since… some time before his fight against the spy. Thinking of the mysterious man that escaped away shot in him a spark of annoyance. He hoped to find the bastard sometime and settle that day's unfinished fight.

However, as he could find no explanation for the current situation, he tried to stop overanalyzing it too much, choosing instead to just enjoy the blissful free time he now had to make as much progress in his studies of the stolen document as he could.

Ensuing that decision, he found himself back in his old room, the one that witnessed some of the most important moments of his life. It was already free of any unnecessary furnishing – not that it had that many before. The hole he blasted on the floor with his first experiment was deftly repaired, the whole space was cleaned and his ninja gear, clay and other smaller possessions properly organized ever since he realized it would do no good to try to work in a horrible disarray.

His progress was pretty astounding, Deidara thought to himself proudly. Only a little time after he got the scroll and he already could easily infuse his chakra into his creations without deforming them. His control was much better and he could make a bird walk and fly as naturally as a real one would. He was going to practice on others too, but the birds were his favorites.

Yet, his art wasn't practical at all. Ever since the boy discovered his artistry was related to jutsu, he decided to use it to fight. What better way to display his art than to use it as a weapon? What better way to make those who witnessed it feel awe and despair? If his artistic ninjutsu became also his fighting style, he would grow as an artist at the same rate he grew as a shinobi; one wouldn't be against the other anymore.

But the fact that the infusion only occurred inside the body was a great inconvenience. His mouth mas clearly his only option, and while he adapted to using it fairly well in the discretion of his room, the lengthy process could cost his life in the battlefield. He had to find a more convenient way of performing his technique. Unfortunately, the scroll didn't present such option at all.

Researching and testing by himself was the only option, and the library was now off-limits, so he would have to trust his own knowledge and instinct.

Because of such a situation, he couldn't think of any option other than one of the first jutsu he ever learned after becoming a genin. It was one of the secondary types, that wouldn't do anything by themselves, but were supposed to be executed in unison with other technique. While he wasn't very satisfied with the idea of using such a simple procedure, the fact was that he couldn't think of anything else.

This technique was created in order to adapt a place to a jutsu it wouldn't usually sustain. A "place" could mean anything, in his opinion, for while most used it to force the space around them to be adjusted to a specific jutsu, he knew, through a quick comment from his teacher years ago – Kami bless his memory! – that some mist nin used the technique on themselves in order to adapt their whole bodies to a water jutsu. The result was that they could easily integrate and mix with water, and their heightened familiarity with the element made them a powerful clan with remarkable control over water techniques.

He truly couldn't think of anything else. No amount of energy exercises and hours of effort or meditation could convince his chakra to enter in the clay and stay there when not inside his mouth.

Deidara knew he wanted to do the infusion with his hands. It would be extremely practical, to create the model and insert life without taking the clay from one place to another. The technique would have to be focused on his palms and fingers. He wanted to be able to close his hands completely over a figurine and be able to perform the jutsu as if it were inside his mouth.

With that thought in mind, he started, activating his infusing technique. Deprived of any object nearby, he could not use it, so the chakra stayed inert and waiting to be applied somewhere. Still holding to it, he made the necessary seals of the adaptability jutsu, that he knew by heart, having done these more than a few times. This last jutsu would identify the first one, and focus on applying it to the place Deidara designated. The difficult part was to focus the effect on himself.

The jutsu wanted to act in his room or in some object, even his clothes, but the blond wouldn't let it. It was very strenuous, but he forced the energy to focus on his palms and fingers, according to his plan. The jutsu would detach itself from his hands numerous times, as if refusing to act in the wrong place, but Deidara kept forcing it, until the energy finally stopped fighting against his wishes and operated where he wanted.

Almost where he wanted. The jutsu was done, now he could do nothing but watch and wait. Worried, he felt the energy running away from his fingers and accumulating on his palms. When the pain started, the blond knew something had gone wrong.

It started as a soft tingling, that grew in intensity and became pain. The pain of burning, with which he was familiar, became worse, a pain of cutting, of carving, deep inside his flesh. He breathed in and out quickly. He was used to pain worse than this, much worse, but the fact that he was messing with his body without having any idea of the results made the feeling much more alarming.

Naturally, when two thin bloody lines appeared, one in each of his palms, that alarm became fright, and the fright became terror as the lines started to widen open and gush out generous amounts of blood. Deidara kept watching in panic as the flesh inside his hands, now visible through the newly opened holes, moved and deformed into incomprehensible forms, and the pain, now unbearable even to him, almost made him blind. He wanted to close both his hands into fists and run to a hospital, but his fingers now convulsed and wouldn't obey his commands. Terrified, he fell to his knees, his palms now down and touching the floor, because he didn't want to look at his hands anymore.

Somehow, and he didn't know why, the technique had gone very, very wrong. While he had considered the risks, those – at least in his mind – never involved having his hands ripped open, torn and deformed. On his knees and with his forehead in the floor he gasped, regretting his thoughtlessness more than ever. What did he do? He had achieved so much. He had incredible luck until now. But he pushed it too far, and now he was going to lose his hands. His hands, that he used to fight, but more importantly, that he used for his art. It was all over. He was now a cripple. He had ruined his life forever.

Still choking in agony, because now his kekkei genkai chakra was all activated and paining him as a whole, he finally fell completely on the floor. Moving his head to the side, he looked at his window from where he was, sprawled all over.

And then he saw, through the foggy glass, a pale face, framed by wavy brown hair, with a pair of very dark eyes and a familiar, stoic expression.

Deidara let out a choked laugh. This was it. Wasn't it? He was ruining himself because of his treachery. Lady Luck abandoned him, and now he would pay for his betrayal… the same hands that sealed his teammate to a terrible fate were being eaten away now.

---

The air in the room was cold. A glance to the window showed that it was dark outside. Deidara was still slumped on the floor, his vision partially blocked by a mess of dirty hair. He allowed himself not to move for a long time. He couldn't feel his hands, and didn't know if he wanted to, but at least pain would mean they were still there. Finally forcing himself to understand that he was going to have to get up eventually, and that Issamu's face had to be an illusion of his tormented mind, the boy closed his eyes tightly and forced himself to turn over and sit up, careful to use only his elbows as support. It was hard work, as he was weak and the part of the blood that hadn't dried yet made the floor slippery.

The blond slowly opened his eyes, willing himself to take a look at his hands, or whatever they had become. To his surprise, they didn't look as bad as he expected. Covered in thick layers of blood, it was hard to see the horrible mess he watched before. If Deidara didn't know what happened, he would have thought his hands were looking very normal. Still, now his head was working more properly. The despair was not there to make him incoherent, just a plain, painful fear, but he could think.

Sighing and resigning himself to whatever fate he was damned to, he got up on weak legs, and made his slow way to the bathroom. His hands protested in pain as he turned on the tap. A relief washed over him though, because his hands were aching but they were working, and that was more than he hoped for. He let the water, that felt very cold, wash the blood away, and carefully but painfully tried to scrub off what wouldn't fall off easily.

Having done the best he could, he lighted a pair of candles – he really needed to get electricity installed again – and sat down on his bed, looking uneasily at his hands.

Now that he had more than moonshine to help him see, he realized they weren't that bad at all. What happened? How come that horrible mutilation had mended itself?

Did the jutsu work?

During his heartfelt horror at the failed experiment, he thought it would be enough to just get his precious hands back, but now that they looked mostly intact, he started, once again, wondering about whether the plan had worked or not.

Deidara wouldn't mess with his poor hands again so soon, no. But the moment they got better, he would try and see if the infusion now worked. Maybe the sacrifice would be worth it. He felt some excitement, and that was a pretty positive emotion compared to what he felt some hours ago, so much he felt a bit giddy and grinned.

Sighing contentedly because his plans could be put into motion again, he jumped when he felt something moving inside his right palm.

Oh no, no, no… the blond looked to the sky and would have prayed, if he knew how. The memories of the suffering before were too fresh.

Yet, as he looked at the hand, he saw nothing wrong with it. Oh, well, there was a small scar in the center, a thin scar… and something moved below it. Very odd. He got up from the bed to bring his hand closer to the nearest candle, so he could see it better.

His face twisted into an incredulous expression. Lips?! What the hell?

And then these lips stretched into a wide, toothy smile.

A long and piercing scream cut the night.

---

Having received today's assignment – village patrolling – the three chunin left the office and started walking towards the starting point. Besides the usual greetings, they didn't talk much. There was no space for casual conversation like before, or at least Kurotsuchi didn't think so. Casually playing and talking and having friendly fights would be falling into routine and accepting that Issamu was not going to come back, and that she was not going to do.

"Since each of us has to cover an area, I was thinking that it would be more appropriate that Deidara takes care of East, because he is more familiarized with the place, that being the Corps' area and all. What do you think?" Akatsuchi asked, since he had clearly taken the leading ever since they all joined as a team.

Silence answered him. Kurotsuchi didn't even deign herself to look at Deidara. Rude idiot. Always being annoying in each and every mission. Her face set once again on the scowl that became almost permanent on her, lately.

"Deidara? Deidara!" Akatsuchi had now stopped and that did catch the girl's attention. She looked to see him trying to touch Deidara on the shoulder. The blond boy jumped and took one step back.

Deidara looked very strange. He had a disturbed look in his eyes and in his expression, and seemed tense. She observed him from head to toe and noticed he was wearing thick leather gloves. How unusual.

"Have you burned yourself?" she asked worriedly, her initial anger forgotten. Her teammate got hurt and only now she noticed?

Deidara seemed to shake himself off his distracted state. "Uh… yeah. I got them burned. Explosion release, yeah? Got distracted. Argh."

While that made sense, Kurotsuchi knew Deidara wasn't one to be so disturbed over burned palms. "Does it hurt too much? Did you go to the hospital already?"

"No, no," he answered, still sounding strange. "No need. You know I can perform some healing, mm? It's all done. Now I only need to let it rest."

She was going to insist, but he looked sharply up at her. "What? Do you think I would let my hands fall off? If I needed to, I would have gone to the hospital, huh. I'm not an idiot."

The black haired girl wanted to insist, but didn't want to bother him. Here, as they stayed in the street corner – Akatsuchi had gone to the other side, probably wishing lot give them some privacy, as they hadn't really talked to each other for too long – she took her time to really study him. Deidara looked a bit pained, disturbed, she couldn't explain. It was hidden behind his sneering face and any other person wouldn't see, but she knew him too well.

Had he been hurting all this time, and she did nothing? Immerse as she was in her own pain and anger – her comrade and friend had simply evaporated, her grandfather told her to forget, and Deidara looked like he simply didn't care enough – had she misjudged him? Kurotsuchi had to acknowledge she was so focused on her own dark thoughts she could have missed such a thing. Deidara wasn't like this, not even when he couldn't even stay up. It was clear that she had been very unjust.

"I… I am very sorry, Deidara-nii," she started, uncomfortable, but knowing she owed her dear friend an apology. "I did not realize… you felt bad too. You tried to make me feel better at the start, I remember – but I shunned you, didn't I? I thought you didn't care… I was so mad, forgive me!"

The blond looked down at her with wide eyes that were now disturbed by confusion. "Wha…?"

"You miss Issamu too, but I didn't realize! But… but don't feel too bad. Hah! Who am I to say such things… but… let's stay together in this and I am sure things will clear up and… we will have him back again. Tsuchikage-sama told you he was merely on a mission, right? Yes, yes. This must be right. Sorry for not believing before."

Kurotsuchi kept hoping that what she said somehow would make him feel better. The boy looked silently at her for a while, and then said a small "ok", before leading the way to their mission's starting point. Akatsuchi followed him and she did the same, too, upset but determined to stop being so foolish and start working properly again.

Deidara strode ahead, his mind a whole mess. It was like having his insane chakra eating his mind away again, because he simply couldn't be coherent. It took him a while to realize the confusing girl was talking about Issamu. Not knowing what to say, he just ended the conversation as fast as he could. Some part of his brain also registered that he was showing a deplorable lack of control over his facial and bodily expressions. But those were small concerns over the fact that troubled him most.

He performed a technique in order to allow his hands to have the same abilities as his mouth… so he got a mouth in each of them.

One of his teammates apparently said something, but he couldn't care less. It was hard to, when the tongue from his left hand gingerly licked the leather that covered it.

Two weeks later

Deidara stared at the dummy in front of him, seeing a challenge in it, for the first time.

The ambient was strangely silent – at least if compared to the usual racket. There weren't many people at the Explosion Corps right now. Maybe the village needed them elsewhere?

Deidara had managed to spend the past two weeks doing taijutsu-only practices. Just coming here made him nervous, but he somehow convinced his instructors to let him work only on that. Since he usually came here just to explode stuff – in a very strategic and disciplined way, yes, but explode stuff all the same – they didn't mind much, and that gave them opportunity to beat him to a pulp. But it seemed like his "luck" was over.

"You lost your kekkei genkai or what, boy?" the rude jonin who usually criticized his lack of control in the past was in charge of him now. "Do it!"

Inhaling deeply, he prayed that everything would go well. Lately, his life was composed of performing dangerous acts while hoping that he wouldn't end up crippled or dead.

Taking two steps back, he very carefully handled his two chakra flows as he would when doing landmine fist, but focusing on his knee, instead. Kicking the dummy, the explosion left him from there, poorly controlled and strong, destroying half of the human replica in front of him. He hissed at the pain of his burned skin. Looking down he could see it clearly, as all cloth nearby had been obliterated, and blood trickled down his leg and soaked his sandal.

"WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM?!" The man shouted furiously, and Deidara balanced himself on his good leg so he would not fall. "Why did you do that?!"

And no matter how he tried to plan beforehand, the blond had no answer for that. None that wouldn't get him killed, at least. His body trembled in frustration. He was screwed.

The jonin hollered at him some more, until he finally took a long look at the smaller boy's thick brown gloves. "Have you hurt yourself?"

Deidara didn't dare reply. Should he say yes? But then the man would ask to see it. Damn it, damn it…

"Answer me! You stupid idiot! I knew from the start. You tried to show off, with those enormous explosions, huh? How bad are your hands?"

Deidara started distancing himself, looking down at the floor and trying to think of a way to get out of this trouble, but the man grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him roughly.

"It is bad, isn't it?" The man looked as worried as he was angry. "You damned, damned bastard. Did you ruin your hands? If you did, you're in great trouble! Let me see!"

The blond finally started fighting back when the man tried to rip his gloves off. This couldn't happen. But the other was faster and wasn't injured, so he managed to grab the boy's right wrist and started pulling the glove down. Deidara hit him in the stomach with his elbow and set off a small explosion that left that patch of his skin. The instructor fell to the floor, hurt by the blast, but started getting up fast enough. Deidara looked the one worse for wear, with the skin of his left arm now also burnt, the new source of dripping blood making him look like a mess.

Now other ninja from the Corps were advancing on him, and he was wondering how he would take them all, when a loud "Stop!" halted everyone's movements.

Gari quickly made his way through the commotion, and no one dared to stand on his way. The tall man with spiky brown hair had a very severe face.

"Leave the boy. Boy," he said, now right in front of Deidara, becoming a barrier between him and his enraged instructor. "Stop causing commotions. Go to the hospital. Or do you need someone to take you there?"

"No, I can manage," Deidara said quickly, and too disturbed to question what was happening, turned around and started limping his way to the exit.

"Gari-sama!" the instructor protested, clearly trying to get to Deidara, but being stopped. "That boy attacked me! And his hands… there is clearly something wrong with his hands!"

The blond just wanted to get out of there quickly, but as he crossed the threshold, he heard Gari's voice, "There is nothing wrong with his hands. And, from now on, his training will focus on taijutsu. Understood?"

Turning sharply from the other men, Gari reached Deidara before he could even think of escaping, and put a hand in the blond's shoulder, pushing him in the hospital's direction. At his current state, he could do nothing but comply. His mind raced with the various outcomes this situation could end in, as he felt some movement inside his pockets. He always kept some of his small designs with him, specially now, that he couldn't use Landmine Fist. His dear creations stirred in response to his own agitation, and he tried to take comfort from their company.

They reached the hospital, Gari finally letting go of Deidara's shoulder as they entered one of the few empty rooms. A medic nin quickly joined them, as per usual. Ninja with bloodline limits or any characteristics that made them listed as important to the village's forces were always given priority. Deidara sat on the bed and let the middle aged woman do her work. As she cut off the burnt remains around his wounds, he clenched his hands very tightly, making sure that she wouldn't be able to remove his gloves.

The brown haired kunoichi didn't pay his hands any mind, covering first his elbow and then his leg with her chakra infused hands. The soothing energy took the pain away and healed his injuries and mended the skin back together, leaving very faint scars that wouldn't remain for long, as he knew from experience. After a few minutes of the delicate work, she finally took notice of his firmly closed fists.

"Is there a problem with your hands?" she asked, reaching for them, and he prepared himself for a discussion, and even for a fight, but his superior's voice quickly cut any interaction between him and the woman.

"There is nothing wrong with his hands. That will be all," and he strode away from the room, his careful surveillance of Deidara vanishing instantly. Not wasting the opportunity to leave the hospital without answering any questions, Deidara quickly jumped from his bed and followed the man out. Gari didn't give him a second glance, heading away and disappearing quickly.

Knowing better than to go back to the Explosion Corps, Deidara started his way back home. His body was now quite fine, but his mind was not at peace – it rarely was, but now it was worse.

No matter how many times he had defied risks and danger until now, there was only so much one could take. Nothing made sense, today more than ever. Why did the leader of the Explosion Corps interfere? He, who hardly ever talked to Deidara and when he did interact, never showed compassion? Gari acted as if he knew exactly what was happening to Deidara, and wanted to help him!

Until now, he insisted on seeing every strange thing that happened with him and around him as mere events that had nothing to do with his actions. Such a point of view was useful in his utopic dream of being able to lead a normal life in the village while having time to improve his art. But this new oddity was a true wake up call, bringing to his mind everything that happened from the day he stole the forbidden jutsu until now. The unskilled chunin guards, strangely assigned to a position that required a jonin, at least. The Tsuchikage's strange comments and attitude. The village's administration blatantly ignoring his neighbors' complaints and accusations of strange behavior. The suddenly easy schedule only for his team, leaving him free time to advance with his talent… and also keeping him inside the village. Now that he thought of it, when was the last time he had been outside the village's borders? And now, Gari acting as if he knew his secret, and wanted to protect it.

Inside his room, he scolded himself for being such a fool. They were all playing a game with him. From the start, from the very start, they knew. No, they knew even before everything happened. He underestimated his village too much, laughing at their inability to discover his misdeeds, and there they were, laughing at him, instead. The awareness that his treason was known made him feel panicked. What were they planning to do to him? He wouldn't be able to look at the old man in the face again without wondering when he would be arrested and killed.

Still, if he was so carefully watched, and if so many knew – clearly the Tsuchikage wasn't the only one – he couldn't just run away from the village as he previously planned to, if he were to be discovered.

Pulling his hair away from his face, Deidara tried to clear his mind. If his suspicions were true, they had been playing this dangerous game for more than a month, now. He didn't know why and didn't think he could discover; what he had to decide now was the best course of action to take. Only now, he would see his village as the dangerous enemy it could be, and be much more careful.

As always, working on his art helped him to calm down in stressing situations. Picking some clay from his storage – he worked more than ever lately – he let the mouths on his palms greedily much at an amount each.

His body alterations didn't bother him as much as they did initially. Really, he heard of men from Mist having their bodies changed to pure water with the adaptation technique – how could he have expected anything but a drastic transformation?

And, as he discovered the past weeks, the mouths were very incredibly useful. After learning to control them to a better extent, they could do the infusion as well as the one on his face. The great difference was that he could have a free hand and speak while doing the whole process, leaving him able to perform other jutsu simultaneously to the infusion.

Of course, they were also horribly inconvenient for being so noticeable. But now, knowing he was most likely unmasked from the start, he had no reason to be against them. Really, they were very unique, the blond thought as they spit out two balls of clay that he molded at each hand at the same time, with the ease that comes from practice. He always thought about himself as a special person, and this new development only made his conclusion accurate.

His hands opened to reveal a scorpion and a small snake, that fell to the floor and obediently went to the room's corner, following their master's silent command. Deidara quickly picked up more clay and repeated the process again, and again, and again.

A few hours after, he admired the crowd of his creations that now filled his room, all full of his gifted chakra, even as he put his hands on what remained of his clay and planned on gathering much more. He didn't know why in the world the village was giving him time and freedom to do whatever he wanted, but he and his little friends would make sure they would regret it.

---

Akatsuchi had watched Deidara acting strangely for some time, even though he was being his usual self, recently. Still, for some days, the boy looked very nervous, getting startled by small things. The strange behavior was so noticeable Akatsuchi had reported it to the Tsuchikage in private, but the man told him to let it be, before assigning another of the mundane missions that even the tranquil teenager had to admit he was getting tired of.

As if to confirm the Tsuchikage's unconcern, Deidara slowly returned to normal. Still, Akatsuchi realized he had the gloves covering his hands all the time.

Kurotsuchi had also changed, but it was clearly a response to Deidara's problem, whatever it had been. She now tried to get closer to the blond boy and were much friendlier with him. It was a nice development, he thought. The team was becoming harmonized. Maybe they would get assigned to more important tasks once they were considered stable and reliable.

Taking a break from the day's assignment, they stopped at a shop where they usually bought lunch. The team sit by one of the tables and started eating. Deidara gorged his food in exaggerated speed, being done in a minute and finishing with a tall glass of juice that went down so fast his teammates watched him worriedly, wondering if he wouldn't choke.

"I have to buy some stuff, but I will see you in one hour, yeah," the blond said as he got up and started to walk away.

Both were once again puzzled by Deidara's attitude, but hardly surprised. Deidara had been quite busy the past week, always making use of any free time he could have. Time for lunch, a break from mission, anything was an opportunity for him to excuse himself to buy something, to gather some clay, to see someone. Kurotsuchi had pestered him as much as she could in order to know what he was really doing, to no avail. Akatsuchi merely watched. If it didn't interfere with their teamwork, then it was not their business, even if he had to admit he was a little curious, himself.

"I think he hurt himself. Don't you?" Kurotsuchi's voice interrupted his thoughts, and he frowned slightly at her anguished expression. It was the same she carried for a week after no news about the Issamu boy, but now it was clearly directed to her other teammate.

"Why do you think so?" he asked, but already knew the answer.

Running her hands through her black hair, that she always kept quite short, she groaned. "He never takes those gloves off. And now, he's disappearing… for some minutes or hours, yes, but it is strange, don't you think?"

Akatsuchi nodded, but tried to calm her. "Maybe he has a side project. He likes sculpting, doesn't he? Maybe he is creating something new, and needs time. From what I heard, he works quite a lot on such things."

"Yes, yes", she answered, not looking convinced at all. "But he is different. You had to see him before. He wasn't… calm, as he is now. Deidara-nii was always fidgeting, impatient, angry, even scratching himself, until he would destroy something. He had a chakra control problem. Then, some day, he disappeared without warning me or…" she looked like she was trying to force down a sob, and her next word sounded choked – "Issamu, but then he came back looking better, and saying he got treatment, or something." Akatsuchi opened his mouth, but she held a hand up impatiently, clearly not wanting to hear more empty assurances. "And then he was being all weird three weeks ago, and he has his hands covered since then, and keeps going away at every possible time. He looked so shaken, since he started wearing those gloves. I'm afraid he hurt himself really badly, this time. I always flinched every time he would let an explosion out of his bare palms, enormous explosions, and tried to believe he would never get hurt, but now…"

Kurotsuchi's shoulders dropped as she poked at her mostly untouched food. Akatsuchi stayed silent as he thought about her words, and their implications.

Then she spoke again, in a lower voice, "and now grandfather is sending us to these silly missions, and I'm worried that he's doing this because Deidara's impaired, because at first it was just strange but it's been more than a month now, and we are the only team being treated like this, I asked around!"

He stayed silent, for once having nothing to say to his young cousin. He didn't want to tell her that the Tsuchikage was far from a lenient man, and wouldn't lower his expectations of an entire team because of one hurt person. If a member got incapacitated, they were simply taken away from the group and substituted, simple as that. Still, the strange situation perplexed him more than ever, now.

---

Meanwhile, Deidara walked around the building of the Rock Village's Academy. The noise of children never ceased to amaze him. When he was their age, he wasn't allowed such unruliness. Actually, when he was their age, he was already performing missions. As he wandered calmly, looking just like someone who was enjoying their lunch break, he let a spider fall from his pocket to the floor. It quickly ran towards an opening in the nearest pipe and disappeared from view, but Deidara could still feel it, as he guided his creation through the many paths the pipes had to offer. More spiders followed soon, infiltrating the edifice underground, inside walls, and on the roof.

They didn't explode, though, just remained in their places. Done for now, he looked around, and the aviary caught his attention. It always did, being tall and thin and even good looking for a place that was nothing more than a house for birds. When he was small, his teachers would give him exercises where he had to describe, with details, the weak points of various structures and the calculated damage necessary to make them go down. Smiling and remembering the time he had written down the many ways to destroy this specific building, he strolled calmly to it, knowing he had just enough time before going back to work.

---

It was late afternoon and, having finished the day's work early, Deidara had just enough time to go to the outskirts of the village where he could find some of his favorite clay. Carrying a heavy backpack and two full bags at his sides, he was going home, where he would store it all and then go to the Explosion Corps.

The streets narrowed and became uglier and poorer as he made his way to the building. Many people roamed around, as the market was closing and everyone made their late shopping. Deidara knew that he could walk straight to his apartment without any problems, as most civilians there were careful not to stay in his way, but he didn't feel like being amidst such noise and disorder, and decided to turn on a much emptier street. This would make a longer way home, but he would appreciate the peace.

Soon, he was engulfed by the quietness. The sun was already coming down and as nighttime approached, his path darkened and the air cooled a little. That was refreshing, after an entire day working under the sun.

Steps could be heard, coming closer, apparently. But whoever this person was, they weren't trying to sneak up on him, so he paid them no mind and kept walking. One tall, bald man appeared from a corner. Taking a quick look, the blond could see it was one of the guards that worked at the Tsuchikage's office.

Decided to get home, the boy averted his gaze and was going to walk around the other ninja, when the man stopped and put a hand on his shoulder, clearly having other ideas.

"What do you have in those bags?"

Deidara shook his shoulder free of the man's grasp, annoyed. He never liked it when people grabbed him like this, and in his current paranoid state, it made him feel much worse.

"If you must know, some clay, mm." It was not like he had to lie. Most people knew about his work with his sculptures.

Unwilling to waste time with this nobody, he started to walk again but, to his annoyance, the man was on his way again. "Is this true, I wonder? What are you sneaking around these streets for?"

While the best course of action was to simply show the man the contents of his bags – the best way to avoid conflict since he knew his theft was discovered, after all – he just felt insulted at having to try to appease this idiot, who was most likely just hoping for a fight. He knew this man – now that he thought of it, this was Chōseki, whose main duty in life was to be a guard, as the man had never got past the rank of chunin, and was an unimpressive one, something quite pitiful for a person who had to be at his late twenties.

"Chill out, man, what could it be, instead?" he said, waiting for the man to get out of his way. Instead, he came closer and once again grabbed the smaller shinobi's shoulder, now with new strength. Deidara managed to let go but it was harder than the first time, and he jumped a few meters away. Looking at the man now, he could see he was becoming hostile. Oh, great. Deidara was very used to his fellow ninja's occasional aggressive attitudes towards him, and usually managed to deal with them one way or another, but given the situation he had been in for the past month, he had to give other people's reactions more importance… and, most of all, he couldn't use his old explosion technique through his hands to defend himself. "What the hell are you doing?" he asked instead.

The man had his hands in fists so tightly closed it wouldn't be surprising if blood slipped through his fingers. With a hateful glare that was much more powerful than those Deidara was used to receiving, he exclaimed in a harsh voice that he made sure to keep low but still felt like he just wanted to scream for all to hear. "You stupid brat! You think we don't know about you? I was on the investigation team! The telltales of an explosion were on what was left of the floor and the walls and even in the way the air smelt! You stole the…" He covered his face with one hand – there was some blood – and put it down, now wearing an expression of forcefully controlled repugnance. "I don't know why he keeps a traitor like you", his voice was now a low whisper, "always knew you were good for nothing, the signs were obvious, and now he says it wasn't you…"

Chōseki was obviously trying to keep from saying much while letting the anger out, but that was enough for Deidara. They knew, they knew. He had expected that, but now it was official. A chill ran through his spine, like in those moments when he thought he was going to die. But he was already used to danger, and kept the panic attack at bay. He was prepared.

But it seemed that he wasn't fast enough to control his emotions as to fool the man who stared at him closely. The blond knew he showed fear, even if just briefly, and that was enough to be guilty in the eyes of the chunin who already suspected it was him.

Chōseki pointed an accusing finger to him and opened his mouth to say something, but the blond gave him no chance. His more cautious side warned him that he really should find a more appropriate way to be free of this situation, but that side of his personality was the one that lost his mental battles frequently. The small spider he had carefully guided to the chunin's neck – just as a precaution, and it looked like being paranoid was paying off – detonated with a blast that was of small range but potent damage, almost completely severing the head of the angry ninja. Deidara avoided the flying gore with practiced ease.

This is it, he thought, and if he could forget the fact he didn't know what the future had for him, he could relish in the fact that routine, oppressive, stressing routine, was going to be over today.

The scraping of shoes against stone just above him made him look up, just in time to see the red sleeve of some rock ninja disappearing as they ran, most likely to call the authorities. Someone had seen him. With a resigned growl – he was in deep trouble for a long time, now – he turned to the messy corpse in front of him.

Disposing of the body with the ease only an earth user could have, he turned in the direction of his home, but then stopped. He should waste as little time as possible. Still, the precious scroll was still there, and Deidara wanted it back. Even though he already drained all the knowledge he could from his prized possession, he didn't want to leave it there. Through that old document, he finally became an artist.

But living in the past was so unlike him. This was his first chance to leave everything he disdained behind. What good would it do to take something he was attached to, something he had to protect? Worst yet, what good would it do to be captured just because he wanted to take a memento?

It was exactly because of such a risk that he always walked with plenty of his prepared clay and as many supplies as he could carry without attracting unwanted attention. Not only that, but he took his time to make sure he had a failsafe plan, just in case. A plan that almost made him wish he was captured, just so he could use it.

Making his decision, with a nod as if to assure himself, he dropped the heavy bags of the raw clay – that kind would be nothing more than useless cargo now – and turned to where the village gates waited for him. Maybe it would be easy. That story of going to retrieve a body he thought he could dispose of felt like it would flow easily out of his lips.

A couple of shinobi intercepted him. Someday I will learn that nothing is easy unless it's a trap, he scolded himself for his previous positive thoughts. A woman and a teenager boy. Judging by his standard red Rock uniform, he supposed this was the person who witnessed him killing off Chōseki, and called for help. He looked a little out of breath and worried, but the woman at his side displayed confidence.

Deidara had enough experience to know when someone was dangerous. She didn't present any of the apprehension or even hesitation that most of his opponents had – his explosive kekkei genkai was very well known, and, because of it, people dreaded the notion of fighting with him in hand to hand combat.

Considering such facts, he was very surprised when she attacked him directly. It was because of his state of alert that he managed to avoid her first strikes, but in mere seconds he got a heavy blow that made him lose his air and hit the wall behind him painfully.

As he got up, he could see her triumphant smile, as she pointedly looked at his covered hands.

So that was it… she risked herself due to the rumor that he had somehow ruined his hands – most likely spread by the Explosion Corps shinobi who witnessed his conflict with the instructor.

The woman unsheathed the long sword that was strapped to her back. Her movements were incredibly fast and he knew he couldn't play around, yet, he didn't have enough time to use his new technique.

Annoyed at having to resort to the strategy he hadn't trained enough as to say he was proficient with, the blond ducked under her first strike and hit her arm with his own, releasing an explosion through his skin.

The woman screamed as the sword fell to the floor with a loud clang, along with her arm. Deidara wasn't nearly as hurt – having previous experience with the last time he tried to release his explosive chakra through a different body part, the damage was not the same as before, even tough his skin felt bristled. His enemy, however, wasn't so lucky. The arm couldn't be reattached even if she were to receive immediate professional assistance, as, thanks to the blast, a great part of it ceased to exist.

"You damn monster! What did you do?"

The kunoichi looked down at her severed arm, pale from the still strong blood loss. The chunin was using his chakra to try to heal the woman, but his humble medical skills obviously weren't enough for such an injury.

The commotion had attracted other people's attention, and he could sense them approaching. Forcing himself to ignore the aches through his body, he knew discretion was now out of question. Deidara laughed, and from the look at the chunin's face, it wasn't a pretty sound.

It could never be peaceful, could it? Not when he was involved. But that was fine. He could get used to it.

It was time to display his creations. To finally know what they could do in action.

He threw his gloves away, without bothering to pick them up. He wouldn't hide anything anymore. The mouths greedily munched on a generous portion of clay from his pouch, and he could hear a disgusted shriek from the boy, who threw something at him that he easily dodged. A kunai – how boring.

This was just a preparation, though. No matter how hard he worked and tried, it took long minutes for him to manage to knead the chakra. With the clay comfortably inside the palms of his hands – the foreign, uncomfortable feeling quickly became natural after much practice – he picked a sculpture at his left pocket and threw it at the older boy, who looked so bewildered at Deidara's behavior, and then at having a white centipede thrown at him.

Deidara was running even before the chunin met his fate. For a few seconds, no one stopped him – some people were confused by the explosion, and seeing one of their own, donning the Rock uniform and running, didn't look so unusual. Yet, as the next opponent appeared, they realized there was something wrong with him and tried to stop him too.

He let some of his creations out, while molding new ones with his left hand, as he couldn't run out of them. It didn't take long for his ex-comrades to realize the power of the small constructs, and the ones with more modest abilities were wise enough to keep out of his way. Twice he was stopped by other people with his bloodline limit, but not for long. It was just as the scroll said; controlling the range, time and force of his attacks was just too much of an advantage. He forced his way through the city, running and jumping over obstacles when he could, and destroying what would stay in his way. The village was soon full of screams and uproar, as the fight started to involve civilian areas.

This was quite fun, and his unnatural, wild chakra was finally proving to be an advantage. The mayhem, the terror and destruction were in such a greater scale than one would manage with ordinary jutsu. His body felt funny and tingled and exalted with joy at finally being able to do what it always wanted to, since he was a small child. He knew he made the right choice.

Obviously, his sudden escape had its advantages. Even if there was a group of people who knew of his treachery, they wouldn't be able to apply surveillance all the time. They weren't prepared for the escape he didn't know he would make a few minutes ago, and the chaos only confused them more.

He wanted to use this opportunity in the best way possible and, because of that, he wasted no time in trying to make his way to the gates. Behind him lay a trail of utter annihilation, and he would reduce his speed so he could enjoy the sight a little more, if not for the urgency he was in – his chakra was finally released, yes, but it wasn't eternal, and it wouldn't do to waste it all.

And, there! There were the gates, closed and forbidding, but he would force them open. The guards looked ready to attack him. Even if they hadn't been informed about Deidara, seeing a member of the Explosion Corps running towards the gates and, behind him, mayhem clearly caused by the bloodline limit, would be enough of a clue for them to know he was now the enemy.

No problem, though. Four of his birds were enough to deal with them; they managed to block one, but the remaining three put an end to the pair of guards. He laughed, euphoric, as he picked another of his creations; yet another bird, but this one was quite special. He didn't need to open the gates to get out of here.

Yet a voice he dreaded to hear called him, and he turned around.

The Tsuchikage.

Even amidst such exhilaration, Deidara knew he was in front of a great opponent, and forced himself – with effort – to stop in his tracks and halt, whereas his impulses screamed for him to somehow make a much bigger explosive and set it on the old man.

"So it has come to this", Oonoki said in a lazy drawl, as if everything that was happening, including the deaths of many of his people and the ruined streets were all a part of his plan.

Deidara snorted with an expression that still held some glee from his past activities. "I guess everyone was right about me, huh? Is that what you're going to say?"

"I always knew nothing could be simple with you involved. Still, nothing that is happening is a surprise; I knew it was you who stole the kinjutsu all along", the man said slowly, as if wanting to enjoy his apprentice's surprise, but he would be disappointed.

Deidara always thought there was something wrong about his situation, and that everything was going too easy for him – he thought his life was at risk from the moment he accidentally found the scroll, yet had been able to steal, study and practice its techniques without interference. But from the moment he realized he had been discovered, he expected such a confrontation. His teacher was annoying, but not stupid. There was no such thing as luck in Rock.

Still, the old man was undeterred.

"From the moment I started teaching you personally, I had this idea in mind. You are incredibly talented; I wouldn't have wasted my time with you, if you weren't. But your lack of control over your chakra when it was at its maximum and your personality disorders made you problematic."

Honestly, Deidara had quite enough of hearing about his own shortcomings. He had heard enough in the past ten years. "So? Why not give the scroll to the other Corps members? Aren't they all nice and obedient?"

"To be honest, what I did was an impulse, when you asked me to go to the library. I had the guards place the scroll there right before you entered. As you must have realized, our results with the technique were limited, and we reached a point where nothing else could be done years ago. I wanted to see what my apprentice, and one of the few people in this village gifted with the talent, would do with the studies of the previous generations. I was right to expect great things from you," he said with a tight smile, "including treason."

Deidara cocked an eyebrow. "Why, thank you, old man. You, who are at the top of the hierarchy that always controlled my movements, ended giving me such power, such… motivation to keep living. But I don't see how it benefits you, hmm. Do you really expect me to be so grateful I'll stay here forever?"

"You do not have a choice. Stop thinking like an individual; you are the village's property before you are a person. That is made clear to every ninja in this village as soon as they enter the academy." The man took a step forward, making Deidara abandon his confident pose and tense. His mentor laughed. "No need to be grateful to me. This is the village's experiments and knowledge and, therefore, its power. Do you think we are giving you freedom? You will be captured and your chakra sealed for the use of your superiors. No matter my plans, the fact is that you are a traitor, after all. You won't be treated as kindly as you're used to."

Deidara took a deep breath, but this time, he didn't try to look composed. There were other ninja approaching now, in what was clearly planned previously. That explained why Oonoki was willing to have such a long talk. But they were of no matter. The short man before him could be very well the one who would end his life. Because death would be preferable to having his movements and energy controlled even more than he ever thought possible. He would set his own explosives on himself before letting such a thing happen. The Rock Village would never again be benefited by his work.

The remaining clay constructs were agitated in his pouch, being affected by their creator's emotions so much it felt like they wanted to take their chances and kill the old man too.

Still, even Deidara could admit he was at an enormous disadvantage. As the seconds passed, more skilled shinobi went to the Tsuchikage's side, just waiting for an order to attack. There was Ittan, who was exceptional with defensive earth techniques, and Gari, who surely couldn't be ended by a mere blast. His messy yellow hair covering most of his face, the blond looked for a way to escape. There was no one between him and the exit, but it would be his death to show his back to such powerful foes.

His attention turned back to the Tsuchikage. With a jolt, he saw the man's hands working on some technique he didn't know. Now that reinforcements arrived, Oonoki was clearly unwilling to let Deidara have any more time to plan. The blond frowned and tried to understand what was happening. Some strange form was forming in the Tsuchikage's hand, like a small white ball, enclosed by a bigger transparent cube. Whatever it was, it couldn't be any good. The structure suddenly expanded in size at a great speed and was propelled towards him. It was by a fraction of a second that he managed to escape. Looking at the place he was just a few moments ago, he saw that a great part of the ground and one of the walls of the tower watch were now engulfed by the technique, but nothing else happened. Was it some kind of trapping device?

Any doubt was cleared when the sphere exploded with a tremendous force. The blast didn't affect anything outside of the cube, the thing kept the blast radius perfectly restricted, but as the technique vanished, he could see that absolutely everything that was inside its range got reduced to very fine dust.

"What the hell?! Do you want to kill me?!" it wasn't like he thought he was secure, but didn't the old man wish to use him? And then, suddenly, he almost reduces him to, literally, a pile of dirt?

"This technique can also only imprison. But I will do what is needed. Do not think you are irreplaceable."

"You think you already won the game, huh? That I'm already yours?" Deidara laughed an insane, loud laugh, the kind he always wanted to let out in battle. "I expected this all from the start. Everything."

"What difference does it make? It just makes you a fool, for not escaping the village you betrayed while you could!"

He was so tired of seeing the man's arrogant face, the expression that told anyone who looked that everything was under control, that this was the end for Deidara. Enough.

"Why flee in a dark night, hiding like a rat? You know, I always wanted to do things with style." Deidara formed the hand seal that was now the signature of his technique.

Clearly losing his patience, Oonoki jumped towards Deidara, and that set him.

"How much do you want to get me?" The blond asked in a whisper that would sound like a curious child's if they weren't in such a situation, and then, with a scream, "Katsu!"

An enormous noise made all the people nearby jump, and screams could be heard from the village's center, where multiple bombs detonated and the academy fell down. An enormous cloud of debris marked the place that was his first target.

The Tsuchikage turned to Deidara with an incredulous expression. There, that was what he wanted to see, the blond thought. This place was always so dead, so tiring. He would make a true show before he left it.

"It looks like I was the one underestimated… I have made my precautions when I realized everything was going too well to be true. Or maybe I just wanted to destroy this place… I don't know. I can list dozens of reasons to turn this place to dust." His laugh was now unceasing. He was not purposefully trying to show confidence, but he just felt so good. The academy wasn't exactly very significant for him, since he never got the chance of attending it like the normal kids, but this place was full of buildings it would be lovely to destroy.

"You…"

"I have been slowly filling this village with the results of my studies, of the things I learned thanks to your generosity." And, dropping the act, "So, how will it be? Me or the village? Not as if it would be worth anything to capture me, if there are no cells left for you to throw me in."

"You damn traitor!"

"Tsk, tsk, tsk… this is no time for ta-alking, mm!" he sang happily, now that he felt he was starting to get control of the situation again. "Come any closer, and the whole place goes boom. Well, what are you all doing here? I think your people need you down there. Katsu!"

He wanted to leave this one for his gran finale, but why not now? As he once again commanded more of his hidden bombs to explode, the tallest building in the village, the Kage office, fell as he first detonated the base, and then worked his way up to the roof, that flew high as the rest collapsed down, the roof falling down with a loud crash over some shorter building. He laughed loudly at the result, and even more at the thought of the hundreds of explosives still left. Every spot of the village was vulnerable to him. It felt so empowering.

The Tsuchikage clearly realized the tables had turned, for he started running deeper in the city, and calling his best fighters, originally supposed to capture Deidara, with him. They would most likely try to hold the buildings with earth jutsu. The few shinobi that remained, terror in their eyes, didn't dare to come any closer, afraid that he would detonate even more of his explosives.

Not that it mattered – the people who were a true challenge were gone, trying to control the chaos and help the hurt. Those who were here were no match. Not wanting to waste his chance at escape, he ran towards the exit, his hand already fingering the very special figurine in his pocket.

It was then that he heard a voice that was very familiar and unwelcome right now. It was clearly a recitation of some jutsu and, before he could do much, he felt himself suddenly stopped, his legs unmoving.

Kurotsuchi was incredibly fast when she shouldn't be.

Feet trapped in the unbelievably hard earth, Deidara tried to take control of the element himself, but Kurotsuchi had a surprisingly stronger hold than him. Agitated, he started trying to pull off the dark mass but to no avail. He couldn't believe he was being delayed because of such a simple thing.

Looking up at the irritating girl, he saw her face set into an ugly expression that was a mix of frustration, anger, determination, and confusion. The ninja behind her were clearly torn between the want to help her and the urge to tell her to let him go before he destroyed even more of their precious home.

"Nii-san! What are you doing?!" she screeched but still held her jutsu firmly, her control over the earth so strong he couldn't manipulate it himself, even tough it was his nature.

The dark haired girl was having the most strange, abnormal, and frightening day of her life. She was already near the gates when the first explosions started and, panicked, she watched the academy turn into rubble. It didn't take long for ninja running towards the gates issue the order to everyone to catch Deidara. She couldn't believe he had anything to do with this, until she got close in time to hear him threatening her home, his home, and show a frightening power of destroying it even while far away – how, she had no idea.

The only thing she knew was that she wouldn't let him go. Because he was destroying the village, because he was betraying his people, and because… she was afraid for him.

She got him there, Kurotsuchi realized, as he futilely tried to break free of her trap. Not knowing what else to do, she just screamed at him, wanting to know what was happening, what he was doing.

Deidara stopped struggling and turned to her by twisting his back, as his feet were bound in the same position they were as he fled. The expression on his face was the one he reserved for enemies, and she almost took a step back and released the earth. Almost.

And then he let out a smile, a smile that looked so sincere, even tough she knew it couldn't be, but it still pained her. "You always wanted a piece of my art… here is a little memento, before I go."

His hand opened to reveal a so familiar white sculpture, and she was bewildered by the situation. Then, to her immense surprise, it spread its wings and flew leisurely towards her. How could that be?

Deidara watched as his teammate passively waited for the little bird to reach her. Her astonished expression was almost endearing. She didn't even know what it was.

And then, at his command, it exploded, noise and wreckage everywhere, and the earth that bound his feet let go, as no one held the jutsu anymore.

As soon as he was out of the gates, Deidara threw his last sculpture to the floor. His hand signal didn't ignite an explosion, however. The bird expanded to a much greater size, becoming taller than him. It spread its wings the blond jumped on it's back, holding firmly the warm clay surface. He could close his eyes and feel the whole structure below him as an extension of his body. But he would need his eyes open for this.

As he soared up in the skies – tentatively first, and then with more confidence and agility – the sight of the village below him and the air blowing on his face awakened a sense of freedom he had only dreamed about, until today. It was what made this whole affair so worth it, what made his decisions so right.

The blond set himself higher and far away enough that he knew he would be outside the village's attack range, and then slowed down. It wouldn't do to go too far. For what he was going to do, he wanted a perfect view.

For, inside the city, many of his creations were still very alive and called for him, waiting to obey his wishes… and, why not? As he had a panoramic vision of the whole place, he could feel his chakra scattered around it. Yes, they had let him go, and he could see the earth techniques already being performed in order to support what remained of the buildings he attacked. But really, did not he dream of this moment for too long? What did he have to lose? His clay bombs would deactivate if he moved far away. A great waste, after such a hard work. No, no. He would make them regret trying to control him, he would make them regret ever giving him access to the forbidden technique.

So he looked down, wanting to savor every moment, before he murmured the word that would set off his bombs, one by one, the hand seal almost touching his mouth. And so the explosions went off, at every five seconds, making a circle around the village, and setting terror once more. Deidara liked working on patterns, but didn't want to give them time to recover. Activating every explosive left, he made them all go at once. The village exploded in huge blasts that made an enormous show, the strength so great he barely managed to avoid being hit by some huge flying pieces.

He kept looking for a while, but turned away, soon, heading to a place he didn't even know. The fun was at the moment of the destruction; raining debris wasn't so interesting, and neither would be having to run from the Tsuchikage, who would be furious at him breaking his promise.

It was the second moment in his life he felt so satisfied, as the village disappeared behind him – he didn't spare it a look anymore, but the image of the destruction would always be in a special place in his heart. There was a spark of annoyance amidst the happiness, however. After all, he didn't set all of the bombs. The two hidden in the ground below the gates were kept intact and would soon run out of chakra and become mere reminders of him to whoever found it, if they ever did. The village's condition was quite hilarious, he thought – everything destroyed but the gates, that remained as strong and sturdy as ever. Not that it made any difference, with the great walls that surrounded the place down to the ground.

Thinking about Kurotsuchi made him realize why he left that part intact. When she trapped him, he could have just thrown the bird at her face and let it explode, but he hit the wall behind her, instead. There was a chance she would be alive, and he could admit that was why he refrained from attacking that section any more.

He frowned. What a soft guy he was. But he would most likely not see them again. Hair loose and flying wildly in the strong wind, he reached above the clouds and kept going, to Kami knows where. He had no plans, no preparation, absolutely no idea of what he would do from now on. Strangely enough, the notion was quite liberating.

Chapter Text

Two years later

At early morning, the Tsuchikage's granddaughter could be seen performing a variety of earth ninjutsu that required more than your typical fourteen years old had to offer. She didn't perform for too long, for her team was soon to depart for a new mission, but still managed to execute many varied techniques without exhausting her chakra.

Finally done, Kurotsuchi looked up at her cousin for approval. He nodded in order to show that she had performed the techniques properly, but still wanted to give her some pointers.

"You need to keep a better contact with earth. Try to keep your feet in the floor. I know that last one makes you want to jump, but you should avoid that, when you can. Also," he said as she paid close attention, "While it is impressive that you're almost starting to create earth out of nowhere, I think you should perfect the manipulation of already existing earth, before. You'll learn faster this way, trust me."

If there had been people who had doubts about the girl's talents, they were proven wrong by now. Her affinity with the Earth element was very strong, even more than the average Rock ninja – he could say she was almost as adept to it as he was. Ever since Kurotsuchi was small and did the test that would verify the ninjutsu she was compatible with, he knew she could be impressive. The girl's work with Earth was her greatest strength, but her recently discovered fire techniques were nothing to be disdained, either – even though he couldn't help her, himself. His sole affinity was with Earth. To know that his little cousin could learn to work with three elements had been a great surprise for him and everyone else, really.

Still, right now, she could only do two. Water was left in the past, for after months of trying to improve and no results, she was told to stop, in order not to halt her progress because of an element she clearly had problems with.

Her, and almost everyone that could control water previously. It had been almost two years since he last visited Mist, but he couldn't forget the very strange things he saw there.

"Show me your golem technique again, Akatsuchi! I'll try to break through!"

The boy almost sighed. He didn't want to tell her it would be a long time before she could do such a thing. Still, perhaps it would do the girl some good to observe the technique that, with chakra, created earth purely from the user's chakra. It was something important to study. Environments without earth were not so uncommon when travelling, and they would have to know how to provide themselves their element.

Just as he started the hand seals, steps could be heard from behind. Kurotsuchi smiled at the newcomer, her attention clearly averted from Akatsuchi's jutsu, so he just stopped.

"Issamu! Are you ready to go?"

The interaction was quite normal, by now. Ever since the boy had, to everyone's surprise, came back, Kurotsuchi had dispensed him her most affectionate side. The first day she saw her lost teammate she was hysterical and would not stop patting him, as if checking if he was real. It was as if, by focusing on Issamu, she could forget about Deidara's shocking defection and the ruined state of their home.

The brown haired boy didn't say anything. From the time when they started being a team together, Akatsuchi learned quite some things about him, specially that he rarely spoke more than the necessary, never reflecting Kurotsuchi's outspoken character. Even then, his demeanor today was strange. Issamu was clearly tense, the face set in a hard expression he probably couldn't control.

A crumpled paper was held in his clenched fist.

Ah.

"Are these news, Issamu?" the big boy tried to ask tactfully. Kurotsuchi grimaced, probably knowing what this meant even before they got an answer.

Issamu's frown deepened and they could hear the paper getting crushed inside his closed hand, just before he took a deep breath and extended them the mangled document, while looking at the horizon and never fixating his gaze in their eyes.

Akatsuchi took it first and started reading, while Kurotsuchi stood close by his side, trying to see, too.

It was clearly a report made by a distant land's ninja – the Tsuchikage often got hold of these.

"So, he strikes again," he finally said as they finished reading the paper, when the silence became too oppressive. The trembling of the girl who was close by his side surprised him, and he took an astonished look at her pained expression. Her eyes were narrowed in an attempt to fight back the tears, her lips firmly closed as she gazed away from the update.

Kurotsuchi hid it so well it was easy to forget how hurt she still was by Deidara's actions.

Throwing his backpack over his shoulder, Issamu didn't acknowledge her suffering in any way, walking ahead. The others followed him to the village's entrance with their own equipment and provisions, as this mission was too far away and could take a while.

As they passed through the gates, that were now circled by recently rebuilt walls, Akatsuchi disposed of the paper, knowing they had seen enough.

Deidara had attacked again, now a great city in the Land of Sky. The damage he did to Rock Village was immense and there was still much to repair, but it was still impressive – and frightening – to see what he could do ever since he abandoned home. According to the report, the whole metropolis was flattened to the ground with the greatest explosion ever known to be caused by the boy, and the Land of Sky was in an uproar at having lost such an important business center. It was no wonder the blond bomber had quickly found his place in the bingo books, as more than a few countries would be happy to have him dead.

It was so hard to associate this terrorist to the talented but peculiar chunin he had known for a short time.

---

"There you go, dear," the middle aged civilian woman said as she passed the tray to the young customer, who quickly paid for the food and sat down by a nearby table. She wondered who the blonde girl was, but only for a while; it was normal to have newcomers and she didn't want to be rude by staring.

Meanwhile, the object of the shopkeeper's thoughts bit on the first candy from the bowl, enjoying the taste. It was nice to eat a sweet once in a while. These past days, such a luxury had been impossible. He had to hide, evade and fight to get away from the Land of Sky, where every shinobi was now thirsty for his blood. The healing, cleaning and searching of new clothes had also been necessary in order to be able to walk around without looking suspicious.

Deidara smiled satisfied at the thought of the last month. It had taken a lot of planning and it was a hard, taxing and dangerous work, but now he could lay low for a while because he felt he deserved a vacation, even if a short one. Money wasn't a problem, and that was a nice thing, since his current project would need heavy investment.

Some of his missions had been a challenge and he had developed a better stamina, agility and destruction power. Still, he wanted to work on a new variation of his art. Composition One, or C1 for short, was how he named the sculptures he had been using the most ever since he left Iwa. He could easily say he mastered those and, months ago, started working on C2. If everything went well – and it would – Deidara would have a new weapon that would be incredibly useful in terms of power and strategy.

Still, C3 was his best creation, until now. Relaxing in his seat and taking a sip of tea, he let the pleasant memories take over his mind.

His client was most likely a commercial adversary of this new target, and decided to win the market competition by destroying the rival completely. Deidara approved of such measures wholeheartedly.

It was rare for Iwagakure to ever send him or his team in a truly interesting mission. Most of their tasks involved very restrictive procedures, a carefully planned step to step strategy that was a pain to follow. He could remember all the times he had a better idea to reach their goal faster, but couldn't act for fear of the punishment that awaited home. With the addition of his erratic chakra that screamed for action, rushed through his body and panicked his mind, it was easy to understand why their condition was so much harder for him to stand than for the others.

Ninja aren't meant to be seen, they would say, but to finish their job quietly and quickly disappear. Deidara couldn't disagree more. Jutsu weren't just weapons, they were art, and should be displayed accordingly.

Thinking about the past only made him happier about his current condition. Never before he imagined his life could have so much potential. As he flew far above the city on his clay bird, a hawk that was his faster one until now, he couldn't help but admire the place. The blond had travelled a lot these past years, and could say this one was special.

Special, and dangerous. Sky High was the capital of the Land of the Sky and was one of the greatest commercial centers in the world. Even Deidara, far away as he was in the Land of Earth, had heard about it in his childhood. People from almost the whole world would reunite here to sell, buy and trade. It was patrolled by shinobi with the authorization of the Sky daimyō, the land's hidden village being close to the city. Deidara came a couple of days ago and, in a rare display of curiosity, decided to get to know the place better, before destroying it.

The walls were erected with some different material, that made every detail perfectly smooth. The whole place was rich and well tended to. Buildings had different designs, some being more traditional, while others distorted in interesting shapes that were very creative and, sometimes, made him wonder how the buildings could stand there without falling, so intricate was the architecture.

The metropolis was also colorful, but it was painted carefully so as to look beautiful as a whole with a nice combination of shades and textures, instead of each owner painting their place whatever they wanted, resulting in an ugly mess. Lights made the city shine even during the day, but it was positively brilliant during the night, specially from the privileged panoramic view he could have thanks to his pet.

Yes, the place was good looking, but he wouldn't spare it. Nothing attractive lasted forever. Eventually it became boring, or decayed, or was plainly demolished… as it would, now. It would be enjoyable to destroy such a pleasant view.

The blond had circled the city with bombs and set them in succession, letting a circle of destruction run around the city, the buildings near the borders falling one after the other, like domino pieces.

Below, amidst the panic, a voice barely audible to him screamed, "It's the Rock's terrorist!"

Terrorist? He preferred "Freelancer Artist", thank you very much. That was what he would put in his business card, if he had one.

Having the shinobi from the Village Hidden in the Sky chasing him through the air – and thus, honoring their home's name – had been a surprise and even excited him a little, before he realized they used mere mechanical constructs, and not jutsu, to fly. No one would defeat his art with mere toys, he knew, as his faster creatures would destroy the devices with a small explosion and his enemies would hopelessly fall to city engulfed in flames.

Still, when the place proved itself more prepared than he thought, attacking with industrial weapons that came from some of the remaining rooftops, Deidara knew he had enough. Picking his backpack, he took a new creation that was too big to fit in a pouch.

Cradling his dear project close to him with both hands, he couldn't help but cackle eagerly, but then, he had done that quite a lot ever since he left Rock. Life was good. There were so many people down there, but also some around the city – they had the time to flee from it – and these lucky ones would have the pleasure to watch his show from a better view. Shaking a little in excitement, he slowly let go of the bomb and let it fall.

The roughly humanoid figure had a carved expression of distress, inspired on what he saw on the face of his targets. A hand seal was enough to show its true size – the enormous bomb opened wing-like arms and fell now much faster. Deidara could see the futile attempts of the ninja trying to stop it, but it was too late. With a new hand seal and his signature Katsu, the overwhelming explosion put a definite end to the whole place. The giant wave of wind and heat almost shook him off balance, and ripped off rocks and trees that hadn't been directly impacted. Huge chunks of buildings he could recognize flew to the sky, before falling messily around, some still on fire. Things distorted, broke and burned under the attack of great power.

Deidara's face rested on his gloved hands, arms bent and elbows over the table, as he remembered with detail the greatest explosion he had created, ever. His face was glowing with a cheerful smile, a warm feeling on his chest making him giggle a little. Someone else's laugh made him wake from his daydreaming. He wondered what people would think of his actions. Surely "arsonist" or "pyromaniac" wasn't the first thing that would be associated with a random person chuckling to themselves at a tea shop, right?

From a table nearby, a tall man winked and whistled to him. Growling, Deidara ate what was left of the food and strode from the room.

He entered the inn where he found a room days ago. The receptionist and the hotel owner smiled as soon as they saw him.

"Are you enjoying Tea Country?" the elderly woman asked and Deidara nodded with a friendly expression. "That is nice to know! I was worried when you came here that night, it was so dark outside. It is dangerous for a young woman to be alone like this, even if this is the one of the most peaceful places near the Land of Fire. If you need anything, tell me, alright?"

Deidara nodded politely once more, before making his way up the stairs. He couldn't say anything, as his voice would betray his gender. Distancing himself from the women, he could hear the receptionist talking to her companion, something in the lines of poor mute girl.

In his first confusing and exciting months as a missing nin, he had been surprised to see some people mistaking him for a girl. That hardly happened in Rock Village, if ever, most likely because he was so well known there. But he soon learned to make use of such an advantage.

His shinobi gear was well covered by the civilian clothes. The strenuous physical activity any active ninja went through developed his body in a way that marked him well as a guy, specially considering he was almost sixteen years old. But when his face and hands were the only thing a person could see, he could fool strangers easily.

Never considering himself very vain when it came to his looks, he didn't mind the useful method he had been using sometimes to disguise himself. It was not like he had a better choice. His genjutsu skills were abysmal and by the time he managed to use a henge, he knew it was so flawed any ninja worth his salt would be able to see through it. A poorly executed illusion calls more attention than your real appearance, Issamu's annoying lecture voice recited in his head, so he decided not to hide behind such a technique.

Still, it was not safe to stay in the same place for a long time. So, after a few more days of sedately living like a civilian, Deidara took his few possessions and left the country. The current plan was to get as far from the Land of Sky as possible and wait for the hunting to slow down.

It was a surprise to be intercepted by a group of thugs as he travelled north. Someone wanted to hire him, apparently. Of course, this could be a trap, but in a job such as his one took risks all the time.

---

The Land of Waves was in an island near Fire Country. Having no hidden village of its own, it still used to be very prosperous, thanks to its strong market. Their affluent land produced exclusive spices and rich food that was sought by various countries around the world. Its citizens were also famous for their talent on weaving, needlework and crafting. While the land's size limited the production, that only made their goods more valued by their clients and, with the great annual profits, it was easy to import anything they couldn't produce themselves.

It was said, however, that any rich land without a hidden village would not last intact for long in this world. That was proven right from the moment a powerful businessman set his eyes on the nation and used their greatest weakness – the necessity of travelling through the sea in order to contact any other place –to take control. Blocking any shipping routes and forbidding importation and exportation unless a heavy sum was paid, Gatō quickly prospered through a reign of subjugation and terror. His mercenaries made sure any protesters were taken care of in a painful and public manner, and the people's spirit was broken as the once wealthy city fell under a strike of hunger and misery.

Being one of the few who still had strength left to fight against their oppressor, Tazuna the Master Bridge Builder decided to take action. Hoping to connect their nation to the mainland, his objective was to stabilize their economy, and get rid of the vulnerability that let them fall under Gatō's reign in the first place. As his attempts were ruined many times by Gatō's operatives, however, and as his workers fell under their violent attacks, he realized it would not be possible to achieve such a dream without help.

That is how, after a very dangerous journey alone through the sea as he hid from the watchers and navigated as fast as possible on his small boat, Tazuna found himself in the Land of Fire and then, the great Leaf Village's central building, talking to Konoha's leader himself.

The tall young man behind the large wooden desk was of a friendly disposition and warm eyes as the builder exposed the situation. Still, after an exhausting journey of such importance, Tazuna couldn't forget the power of the one he was talking to, and how imperative it was to convince him to listen to his plea.

It was after a few days deliberation and negotiating not only with the Hokage, but also with the council – for no matter the good reputation of the Leaf Village when compared to the others, it still wouldn't do anything for free – that it seemed things would be done.

"Please understand we cannot send ninja to keep a permanent patrol in your Land. That would be understood like creating an extension of the Leaf Village outside of the Land of Fire, and that would raise conflicts."

"I don't understand much of politics," The old man answered, scratching his head and looking troubled, "but as long as we maintain our part of the agreement, we will need help. What if this problem starts all over?"

"I understand, I've thought about that, and discussed it with the council. While we cannot leave part of our forces there with you, the Leaf Village will always answer when your land calls, working for you for considerably lower prices. We will make sure to give you rapid means of communication. Our arrangement is beneficial for our land, too. We won't have Waves subjugated again."

Tazuna nodded, trying to convince himself this would work. After all, giving Konoha such an advantage in commerce was indeed a huge deal, specially considering the financial power of Waves when it wasn't under Gatō. Maybe he could trust the village. Honestly, he had no choice, so he would ponder no more.

"Now, for the papers," Minato Namikaze said as an afterthought, reaching for a folder in a drawer under his desk. A loud bang of the door being forced open made Tazuna jump, but the Hokage merely sighed, not looking surprised at the sight before him.

As Tazuna set his eyes on the young boy that just entered, he could understand why. The kid that was almost an exact copy of the leader of Konoha. He looked exuberant and full of energy, even for a child, but the most attention catching thing was the hideous orange jumpsuit he wore. Was that a ninja hitai-ate on his head? Surely it couldn't be. His vision must be failing.

"Dad!" the weirdo screamed as if said man wasn't mere two meters away, "we're done with that mission! And it was stupid! Give us a higher ranked one!"

Seeing the once quiet atmosphere being dissipated by the blond's rude actions confused Tazuna to no end, and so did the idea of a small and loud kid being so rude to the village's greatest authority. He decided to just slouch on his chair and watch. From the same door came a masked man, another ninja, with silver hair and a bored expression. Behind him trailed other two children the same age as the first. One had pink hair, but he was already getting used to this place's eccentricity.

"Naruto, you should address the Hokage by his title when in duty," the masked man scolded in an uninterested tone while reading a book, looking so indifferent it was like he already knew there was no point in trying.

"You've just become a genin, Naruto. Be patient. It won't be long before I can assign your team to different tasks," the Hokage answered sternly.

"You have been saying that for like, years!" the blond screamed once again, only to be whacked in the head by his pink haired friend.

"Naruto, shut up! You're being too rude! We're going to be in trouble!" the little idiot whispered loudly, as if believing no one else could hear her.

"We've also only been genin for a little while," the third child, a dark haired boy, and the only one who looked like a normal person, admitted reluctantly, "but it would be nice to have something new."

"Now, now, that is enough, all of you!" the Hokage said severely, and the children looked down. "Kakashi, what did you come here for?"

"Just to leave the report of today's mission, sensei, as it was completed so fast-"

"You're not calling him Hokage either!" Naruto made sure to loudly complain, earning for his efforts another punch from the ferocious girl.

"You're all lucky then, getting the rest of the day for yourselves. Come back tomorrow and you will have a mission," and as he saw his son's eyes sparkle, "a D rank mission."

Protests were instant. "That is not fair! We've been doing well!"

The blond man seemed to take pity on the boy and reached his arm over the table to ruffle his hair. "Patience. You know what? Stop complaining and I'll make sure to arrange something exciting for you guys."

"That's awesome! Thanks, dad!" and his teammates seemed as happy as he was, even if they didn't demonstrate that so openly.

"Now, out with you all! You too, Kakashi. I'm having an important reunion. I apologize, Tazuna-san…"

Both men were left alone once more. Signing the papers offered by the Fourth Hokage, the bridge builder who was a genius in architecture but not in politics knew he had been able to defend his cause. The Land of Waves would be restored to its peaceful state and, in exchange, the Leaf would have preference in any commercial trades for an "undetermined time" that, for him, sounded suspiciously like "forever". It was quite big a deal for Waves to make, but they had no choice.

Not long afterwards, Tazuna started his way back home, accompanied by a team of powerful ninja sent by Minato Namikaze. It looked like his home would be free, at last.

---

While the Hokage's decision to have strong ninja accompany Tazuna-san to his home was understandable, Kurenai thought it was a bit of an overkill to send a couple of ANBU running ahead. Wasn't the whole problem the scheme of some rich civilian? Surely the threat couldn't be so great as to deserve such attention?

While everyone tried to be inconspicuous while riding the boat, it seemed like the watchers were more careful now than when the bridge builder trespassed this way himself. Still, the ANBU quickly dispatched those who tried to block their way, knowing that the mercenaries in the land were alerted to their presence.

It was when they were confronted by their fist enemy ninja in the Land of Waves that the Hokage's precautions became understandable. This man, Gatō, had to have immense power and influence in order to hire one of the Seven Swordsmen of Mist. Kurenai knew the fight would be a difficult one, even with other jonin at her side. It was then that the ANBU, that she thought had ran too far ahead to notice their problem, came back and decided to act. Working in unison, the ones with the weasel and bear masks had a fierce battle that, in the end, clearly would be a victory for the Leaf.

Zabuza was caught in a powerful genjutsu Kurenai couldn't really identify, and the weasel masked ANBU who cast it readied his katana for the final strike. To everyone's surprise, the enemy's body fell to the floor before this happened. Back and neck pierced by precisely thrown needles, the Demon of the Hidden Mist was now dead, and everyone tensed at the idea of a possible new battle.

"Thank you for your help," a soft and polite voice said, and everyone looked up at a masked ninja who was standing in the branch of a tall tree nearby. "I have been chasing this one for a long time."

A hunter nin from Mist. That wasn't surprising. It wasn't the first time they saw such a person, Mist being the village known as the most vengeful towards traitor shinobi. They would chase and kill any nukenin to wherever they went, taking or destroying their bodies in order to retrieve or protect their information. Kurenai couldn't help but think this one had conveniently waited for the Leaf ANBU to finish this one for him. It wasn't a surprise when this newcomer shinobi announced he would take the body and started walking towards their fallen enemy.

"I don't think so," the weasel masked ANBU said in his customary soft tone, sounding decisive nonetheless. "We appreciate your help, but his body will be sent to the Leaf Village."

The ANBU with the bear mask took a step towards his comrade, sounding hesitant for the first time since they arrived. "Listen, Weasel, I'm not so sure about that. Zabuza is a Mist shinobi; it is natural that their hunter nin would take his body, and not us. We are in risk of initiating an unnecessary confli-"

Weasel raised his hand, interrupting the other's speech, without ever taking his gaze away from the masked newcomer.

"This is no Mist nin," he said with conviction, and what happened afterwards was so fast only trained eyes would be able to see.

It was impossible to know who moved first, the weasel ANBU or the supposed Mist hunter nin that had just been declared an enemy. Both showed an immense speed and, in a blink of an eye, were in front of the fallen Zabuza, kunai against kunai. Weasel unsheathed his katana once again, making the stranger retreat.

It happened that the boy – or girl, it was hard to tell – was an incredibly talented person and also possessed a very handy bloodline limit. His speed was astonishing and frightful, and the fact that both ANBU could follow the enemy's movements through the powerful ice mirrors made it clear that they were most likely from the Uchiha Clan. The Body Flicker technique was intensely used by one of them with incredible swiftness, identifying Bear as the famous Shisui, the Teleporter.

The stranger's ice techniques weren't performed perfectly, however, and the Uchihas got enough of an advantage so that only Shisui dealt with the enemy, while the other jumped to Zabuza in order to dispatch the man for sure, the katana posed over the nukenin's heart.

Clearly more desperate to protect his comrade than anyone expected, the boy threw himself between Weasel and Zabuza. The katana pierced through his body, that fell into a bloody mess over the man. As everyone looked shocked at such a scene – everyone but the ANBU, but who could see behind these masks? – Weasel calmly took the false hunter nin's body away from Zabuza's and, leaving it two meters away, walked back to the swordsman and knelt in front of him. Everyone expected a new katana strike, but Weasel merely took hold of one of the needles buried in the man's neck and gave it a sharp push and twist. The man's body shook violently for two seconds, and then he was no more.

Still, the bear masked ANBU pierced Zabuza right through the heart with his tantō, clearly wanting to eliminate any doubts about whether the man was alive or not. The weapon had no pointed tip and thus was not designed to pierce, and that only made the whole thing a bigger mess.

"That was not necessary," Weasel said, but without showing any kind of irritation, "I made sure he was dead by that needle."

"Sorry man, but that one was tough and it would really suck to have him come back from the dead somehow. I really detest senbon. I always expect people to just get up because the person who used then messed something up."

If Weasel noticed the jab at his abilities, he didn't show it. Bear was more talkative than expected of someone from the Black Ops, and continued, "that was stupid, wasn't it? Some random shinobi trying to stop us from doing our work. I mean, he was good, really good for a kid, but with two jonin and two ANBU here, what did he expect?"

His partner, the shorter and quieter of the two didn't answer the rhetorical question, and just knelt before the dead youngster once more, softly closing his eyes.

---

Deidara walked through the town in his usual civilian attire, but now, more than ever, he wished he could perform genjutsu… more specifically, a very powerful henge. He had yet to hide his first bomb.

His damned employer never said anything about the leaf shinobi – actually, the bastard had gloated about this place being so desolated and defenseless! Deidara was decided to do his job, but things would be much more difficult now. He would make sure the man would pay him double for the trouble, no matter what.

The men he met days ago at Tea Country took him to a lifeless, ugly place somewhere in the borders between the Land of Rivers and the Hidden Village of Rain. There stood a man who was clearly very rich, but not in his favorite environment. The mission was clear – terrorize a small land slowly, by attacking it progressively, destroying one part at a time. Stop only when they got control, and otherwise, completely finish it. It will be a piece of cake for someone of your caliber, the ugly midget said, as it was a civilian city and the population would have no means to defend itself or track his bombs. Moreover, he would be very well paid. Now here he stood, trying to stay calm as many ninja of various ranks cleared the place from Gatō's men. It didn't take long for him to catch on the story, and discover that roughly a week ago, one of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist, also hired by the same employer, had been killed by Konoha ninja. Gatō's men had been killed or fled, and they were now making sure there was no enemy left in Waves before going back.

He was still going to do the job, however. The mission in the Land of Sky hadn't been any easier, after all.

But he would force his employer to pay three times the amount they had established. Or maybe four, he growled in his mind, as a jonin, immerse on some orange book, walked so close to him they almost touched arm to arm. Was that Kakashi Hatake, the S-ranked copy ninja that was on every bingo book he ever put his hands on? Scratch that. Five times. I will be paid five times more, even if the bastard goes bankrupt.

---

One week later

Sakura walked leisurely back to her team's temporary home. Once again, her friends left her behind because of some stupid new competition between them. There was still work to be done that the two boys left behind, and the girl was ashamed to admit that the civilian men were much stronger and could do a better and faster work than she ever would. Still, it was normal for a girl to be weaker than a man, right? Sakura wanted to be strong, but she still remembered Sasuke-kun's disappointment when she was the first to climb the tree on that test. She really didn't mean to show off.

As promised, the Hokage sent them on a different mission – C ranked and, according to the friendly leader, they were to protect a village that had been attacked by a great number of men, ninja and civilian alike. By coming here and catching up on some information, however, she was quick to realize the man was actually exaggerating, most likely to mollify his son. Whatever clash that happened here had ended days ago, and they came just to help on some rebuilding. The ANBU and jonin that were still around had finished the job and were going to go back home soon. This mission was much more like a travel to get to know a new environment and train under Kakashi, who was forcing them to do exercises and spar the whole day.

Naruto was still excited, nevertheless, expecting some powerful challenger to jump from a nearby bush and engage him in a fierce battle.

Even Sasuke-kun was, to a certain extent.

Deep in thought about how she could call Sasuke's attention without irritating him in the process, she collided with something solid. The person grunted. Looking up, she saw a girl – no, a boy, actually – that was older than her. He wore some heavy green robes and his head was covered by a hood, but his face was visible enough, and she could see some long strands of vivid yellow hair, and almond shaped eyes of a warm blue. His skin was a little darker than a blond's usually was, a suntanned tone very like that of Naruto's – the boy's colors looked a bit like her teammate's, really.

"Forgive me, I wasn't paying attention," she quickly apologized. He glanced at her Konoha headband and, to her dismay, snorted in contempt – most likely at seeing such a clumsy ninja. It was not the first time a civilian mocked her in this island, and she really longed to go home.

"What's up with this hair color? Huh?"

Oh, so that's what it was. The frown had been because he'd been looking at her hair. Well, he certainly wasn't the first.

"It is a genetic mutation, I hear. No one in my family has had pink color before."

He reached with a hand and took a strand, letting it fall through his fingers, and smirked. "Cool. Pretty exotic, hmm… thank Kami you're not a boy, or this would be pretty weird."

Sakura could feel her cheeks burning after being under this stranger's scrutiny. She felt very shy by being looked at so intensely by the blond. "Er… yes. T-thank you."

"Yeah, whatever," the boy answered, and all of a sudden his gaze was so uninterested, it was like he was never being nice to her before. The indifference he now had in his eyes was startlingly close to Sasuke-kun's. Sasuke-kun! How unfaithful she was being to him, falling for a random teenager's charm! As she kept shaking her head and trying to clear her thoughts, the boy walked past without a word and disappeared by the closest corner, as no civilian should be able to, but she wasn't really observant.

---

A week had passed, and some ninja were already leaving the village, clearly believing the danger was over. Deidara started feeling optimistic again. He felt nostalgic at leaving his creations to slowly fill the place in holes, hoofs, trees, pipes and every other entrance here and there. It really reminded him of good, old times. He did have to be extra cautious now, with the random leaf ninja wandering around, but from what he gathered, the most dangerous ones had gone already.

Leaving his little spy at that girl's ridiculous hair had been an impulse of the moment. While he didn't think such a low ranked shinobi – if she was truly one, really, the clumsy idiot – would have access to any important information, he knew it would be very unwise to leave a tracking device or anything with his chakra on a more talented ninja.

He still had to contemplate about how great his art was. While his picture and description was printed in any updated bingo book, people had yet to understand how he worked and learn how to stop him. Not that he planned to ever let them do such a thing.

The city was surrounded by thick foliage, and while circling its borders, he sensed the very familiar sensation of being watched. Not feeling very patient, he turned quickly in order to catch the stranger, but all he saw was a shadow disappearing among the trees deeper in the forest.

His eyes narrowed. Were they a civilian or some genin, they wouldn't have been able to vanish so fast. He had most likely been spotted but not engaged – people knew he wasn't easy to destroy, after all.

How inconvenient. Deidara quickly and silently started following whoever it was deep there, leaving his infiltration task for later. He would get rid of this person, otherwise they would contact other leaf ninja and he would never complete this operation.

After a long time had passed, Deidara started feeling perturbed. Since when was this island so big? He had been searching for the stranger for too long – the man or woman could have called reinforcements, for all he knew, and he felt fidgety. It was annoying when his instincts told him something was wrong, but not what. Never one to ignore his uneasy mind, he started to discreetly pay more attention to the path he walked through. It was covered in wet leaves, as per usual in the Land of Waves. Somehow, it troubled him, though. Careful not to change his countenance, he took note of small details.

Most of the leaves were in shades of dark green, but some were yellowed. One was slightly broken, probably having been stepped over. It was covered by dirt at the left side and had two small holes at the right, with a tiny worm biting a third one. Ten meters of walking ahead, and according to his suspicion, he saw the same leaves again, including the leaf with the bites, identical to the previous one in every detail. That awoke the memory that made him realize his current situation.

Issamu divided the home he lived in with other people, and Deidara had never been there before, but he wanted to ask for something. It was one of the very few times Deidara saw his male teammate outside of a mission or training for the years they've worked together. After seeing what the brown haired boy was doing, he couldn't hold back his disdain.

"What are you doing? Sketching won't make you a true artist, got it? It's one of the most uninteresting manifestations of art…"

Issamu stopped the drawing he was making in a big sheet of white paper, with many colored pencils at his disposal. Various shades of brown were being held by his nimble fingers, as he worked on the image of a terribly uninteresting – but very realistic, the blond could admit – wall of earth and stone.

"Genjutsu can only be masterfully done by a creative mind. Otherwise, you will not be able to reproduce reality perfectly, and an attentive person will soon notice they are trapped. Look at this wall," he said as he pointed at his drawing. "Let's say it is the wall of a long corridor you want your enemy to believe he is walking through. Now, not only must you make it look exactly as a true wall would, with the correct texture, shadowing, color and so on, but you also must be careful not to make mistakes that are quite common. That is a nice way to recognize you fell under an illusion, you know. People often have only a limited number of images of a certain item in their mind. After a while, you would notice a pattern in the walls, if you observed carefully. For example, stones of the exactly same shape, roughness and imperfections would be seen again, and again, and again."

Surprised at the enormous speech his normally silent teammate just let out, Deidara decided to take note of the undeniably useful information.

"Your inability to cast genjutsu is surprising, Deidara. You're very inventive, I am sure you could be an above average user of illusions. Maybe it would be easier if you saw them as a new kind of art?"

Genjutsu was not art, Deidara still believed, and thrust the memory away, even if he was grateful for that information the boy gave him years ago. Not that his once comrade – who surely was dead – would be very happy if he knew he was helping him, now.

Well, he'd dawdled enough.

"Kai!"

The illusion dispelled like a curtain falling from its hinges. On its place stood a forest, much like the one of before, but he didn't know where he was. Moreover, the sky was a little darker. It was nearing twilight, but the genjutsu did not take care of playing the sunset. Disgusted at himself for not realizing his predicament earlier, he assumed a fighting stance and decided to abandon stealth. He angrily threw many of his smaller and faster designs and let they run through the forest.

This technique wasn't perfected yet, but it would have to do. After letting the clay bombs scatter, he made a hand seal and closed one of his eyes, while carefully paying attention to his surroundings. Calling to his creations, one at a time, he started to feel and search for this enemy so he could end him or her at once.

After some minutes passed, he gave up in frustration. What a day this was! Likely, he had already been spotted by Leaf's forces, who could jump on him at any moment. Terribly frustrated by his bad luck, he turned back to the city. He would activate the bombs he left there and get out. The mission was doomed from the moment the island flooded with talented shinobi who were already alerted to the enemy's presence, so he would have to leave for a long while before starting again, or think about a new plan. Gatō better understand he would need more time. Oh, screw Gatō – the bastard owed him a lot for not warning in advance about the land's situation. Had he known, he would have made the same preparations he did for the Land of Sky.

As he ran back to the city, he realized the genjutsu he'd been under had been complex indeed. He wasn't so far away and most likely had been walking in circles, while believing he was walking in straight lines. How mortifying.

Not too far from the city, a pressured jet of water came his way, cutting through the ground. It almost hit him but as he avoided, it hit the floor instead, making a hole that would have been on his head, otherwise. Looking above, he felt a familiar chakra – one he had sensed only once, but had never forgotten.

An old man jumped to the floor some meters away from him. The face and energy was unmistakable, and even the water attack that wasn't perfect but could still do some damage.

Not that his foe did anything to try to conceal his identity. The hat, the clothes, the backpack, even the damn shoes were the same. That was the spy that invaded and fooled Rock multiple times long ago, the one he fought against and lost, in his last months as a Rock ninja.

What in the world was he doing here? Was he the one responsible for the illusion?

While the man was an old pet peeve of Deidara's, the city was still a priority, right now. He couldn't afford to be held back any longer.

Running forward and attacking him, hoping to dispatch the man quickly – Deidara had grown a lot this past year and a half, surely he would be able to, now – he started hand to hand combat. The man, at first, avoided his hands like the plague, before realizing there were no explosions coming from his palms.

Landmine Fist hadn't been an option for a long time, after all. But he had something better.

Still, he tried to end the fight fast and without using his bloodline limit. That wasn't his usual strategy, but he wasn't on a casual fight, and if a huge explosion from the forest wouldn't warn everyone in the city of his presence, he didn't know what would.

Battling only with taijutsu proved harder than he expected. It made him wonder if he was being too lax with his physical training because of his long range abilities, but after being assaulted by a whole new set of strikes he was sure he had never seen before, the blond could say the man got better, too.

"What do you want with me, hmm?"

The man merely ignored him and, surprisingly enough, hit him with a water bullet from his middle and index fingers, all while still fighting closely. A water jutsu without the aid of a seal was unexpected and he got hit on the ribs, one clearly fractured or broken with a painful crack sound.

As it became clear he wouldn't be able to win this fight like this, Deidara jumped far away and decided to try fighting middle range. This way, he would be able to avoid the water the man had skillfully used as a complement to his taijutsu.

One of his earth barriers were more than enough to block the next onslaught of water attacks. Ever since years ago, he had yet to see a truly powerful suiton jutsu, after all. This man was good, but not enough.

As time passed, it was obvious that both of them wanted to end the fight as soon as possible. The man's impatience became obvious when all of a sudden, Deidara found himself being ambushed all around by many clones. A mix of kunai, shuriken and incredibly proficient movements and then scratches, grazes and painful cuts started to appear while he could barely touch his opponent.

He didn't expect this man to get so much better. Old people didn't evolve much, specially physically, over the years – quite the contrary. Still, it was clear he would have to actually fight seriously if he wanted to get to the city any time soon. There went his small chance at a surprise attack.

Frustrated at once more having his plans going down the drain – this was happening too frequently today – he opened a pouch and let the mouth on his left hand munch on some clay. The man's eyes widened, clearly surprised at seeing such a thing. Deidara smirked at finally getting some reaction but, to his annoyance, the enemy's expression closed once more into a blank mask.

To his chagrin, his attacks had to be moderate. His clay wasn't infinite. When attacking the Sky High city, he brought not only a backpack and two pouches full of clay, but also many pre-made creations. Here he thought only what he had left would be enough, and that was his mistake.

Unable to merely activate the bombs leisurely, Deidara tried to spread them in many places and detonate when his enemy got close to any. Strangely enough, his foe seemed to be very lucky, for he had yet to come into contact with one. Deidara tried to use an earth rising jutsu to push him into a nearby bush where a couple of clay beetles waited, only to have him avoid the place as soon as possible, eyes fixed where his creations were hidden.

That proved it – he could somehow sense them. This was getting out of hand. How could he? This was no time to discover, though. Time was passing and, if things stayed this way, Deidara could actually lose this fight.

Still, his small friends weren't only around leaves and ponds. He became quite adept at creating underground creatures.

With a shout of "Katsu", the ground below the man caved in with numerous explosions. He clearly had a very hard time trying to avoid them all, and started getting injured. The spy seemed so surprised at being actually hurt by the blond boythat Deidara couldn't help it – he felt really insulted. Oh, well, all the worse for the man, for having underestimated him so much. Being thrown at a clearing with nowhere to hide, and knowing the clay constructs were around almost every tree, rock and plant around – he could do nothing to avoid the recently created centipede that now ran to him extremely fast. That was a big one, and Deidara made sure to jump far away before the detonation.

As he turned with a smile for finally ending that bothersome pest, because there was no way he could stop his bomb, Deidara hesitated when he saw him making some strange hand signals that didn't look like activations for any water technique.

An enormous ball of fire – of such proportions one would need great reserves of chakra or exceptional control to make – was shot from his enemy's mouth. While fire didn't have any advantage over Deidara's elements – earth and fire itself – the power of the attack was so strong it completely obliterated the bomb and reduced the explosion's power greatly. Deidara had to be incredibly fast to avoid being cooked alive, for he knew no barrier of his would hold that fire back. He was so astonished at that powerful jutsu of a completely unexpected element he didn't dodge the kunai that was thrown from it and embedded deep on his shoulder. Screaming, he ripped it off and jumped right through the remains of the fire, just to see the old man running towards the city in a greater velocity than he had ever showed, disappearing among burned trees.

The hell?

Wasn't this the same man who was wearing down as time passed and the fight went on? And suddenly he performed a jutsu that required an abundant amount of chakra and ran away with great stamina?

Was he holding back all this time?

The only thing the blond could do was run in the same direction, but he still lost the other ninja from sight. Still, the man was in the city, that was for sure. Not that it really mattered – the conflict in the forest must have alerted everyone in there. Even the ninja who were travelling back home could be going back right now, if they managed to communicate fast enough.

Reaching the city's gates, but not entering it still, he heard the commotion as people evacuated and a ninja leader gave orders to a group.

Deidara let out a loud growl in a display of uncontrolled anger. Oh, this was it. To hell with it all, the place was going down. He would make sure the bombs he already infiltrated would destroy the city. Those would have to do, as he had little clay left with him, and using it would mean having no means to travel back. He just wished he had brought Composition 3 so he could do the same he did in Sky's city. Yes, that would make him feel much better.

"Kats-"

He froze, his hands halted on his signature hand seal. What?

As he felt for his creations – he was very sensitive to them – he felt one going down and, before he could believe it was merely a mistake of his angry mind, another one. Slowly but surely, each of his bombs were disappearing from his range and therefore from his control, like a bunch of string lights being turned off one by one. The rate of deactivation became faster, and before he could think of forcing the ignition of the few that were left, even those vanished, leaving the city as if he hadn't left his explosives there at all.

Who was deactivating his work? And how?

Running to the city and ignoring the warnings from his instincts, he ran street to street and jumped over the rooftops, trying to get to where his last sculptures disappeared from his senses last. Finally reaching the corner, he dropped just to meet the man who apparently was decided to become his nemesis.

There, standing with a katana piercing through one of his now unmoving birds, stood the thrice damned old man. He dismissively let the sculpture fall to the floor and break in dusty pieces, stepping over it in clear derision.

Breathing harshly, the hurt rib and shoulder both a burning pain, Deidara tried to find a way to take control of the situation, but there was none. All he had left was a small amount of clay. He could make his creations out of pure earth but that would take time he didn't have. Without landmine fist, all he could do was hope to destroy the spy with a combination of taijutsu and explosion release, but he had yet to become adept at letting explosions out from his body without hurting himself. He had focused too much on his art.

Never before had he been so disdained. Ever since he left Rock Village, his art caused fear, despair, awe, outrage, the most varied emotions from the witnesses – but this scorn, this indifference… he was being challenged, and with no small amount of disrespect. Today, his opponent held back in a fight, as if Deidara was such an easy foe there was nothing to worry about. Then he made sure to destroy his plans, to mock his work as he easily took the life away from his creations, leaving then unmoving sculptures… forcing his art to go back to its previous state, before he discovered the forbidden jutsu, before he developed his beloved technique. Degrading him back to the chunin who was merely one of Iwagakure's many tools, the boy who had art on his heart but couldn't express it, restrained to dead and uninteresting figurines that were no better than some oddly shaped rock.

As he opened his pouch to pick what remained of his clay – he would never again go to a mission with so little – many Konoha ninja made their presence known. In his resentment, he wanted to somehow take them all. Yet the spy, clearly alarmed by the arrival of the Leaf's forces – wait, wasn't he from Leaf, himself? – Started retreating behind a row of houses.

Before disappearing, he turned and pointed one finger at the blond. "Sorry, Deidara-san. Maybe next time."

And then Deidara found himself alone, but not for long. Strong shinobi were approaching, and he knew there was no way he would win, not today. He had invested too much clay to infiltrate the place, and now his creations were all left unusable, so he couldn't call them back to him as he usually would.

Barely having time to once again leave the city, he ran back to the forest, now very careful not to fall into a new illusion. With the help of Moguragakure no Jutsu, a handy technique that allowed him to hide and move below earth, he managed to get far enough to use what little clay he had left to hastily build his means of transportation.

Leaving the city on his flying bird, Deidara cursed over and over again as anger made his vision red, while he dearly hoped the old man wouldn't know a way of stopping his creations from a long range. Falling from such a height would kill him, but he couldn't flee closer to the ground. Land of Waves was over for him now, but next time he saw the spy he would destroy him, he really would. That he swore to himself.

---

Drying the sweat from his brow, said spy entered the room he had been living in these past days, carefully locking the door behind him.

The Rock missing ninja Deidara was indeed a better fighter than he ever expected. The boy he met two years ago had grown considerably. He had never expected to be forced to use his primary element on him.

Now that the young man, who was clearly very intelligent – when not seething in insane anger, of course – had seen not only his Fire jutsu, but many other factors to piece together, was there any point in keeping the façade? It was frustrating to lose the effective cover he had lived under for the past years. Maybe he would try use it some more.

He dropped his powerful henge, and the wrinkled skin of a sun tanned face gave place to much more younger and paler features. The frizzy grey hair straightened and fell down in a dark cascade on his back, his height and weight reduced slightly, and he started taking off the timeworn robes in order to wear his usual gear. He would keep the old pieces of clothing, though. This persona of his was clearly the key to destabilize the deranged arsonist.

Some hours ago, back in the city and scanning it for any traps, it was a surprise for him to detect the rock nukenin's chakra scattered all around, and understand what it meant.

It didn't take him long to realize the bombs were mainly earth based techniques, and what was the element that could stop them. He couldn't deactivate the terrorist's bombs by himself and had to recruit ninja with Lightning Release. His own partner was so fast he managed to pierce most of the bombs by himself, and Kakashi Hatake had done a good job, too. Still, the dark haired teen, while in his spy disguise, made sure to pierce the already deactivated statue with his katana and step on it, so as to make the boy believe he was the responsible for the device's "death". If there was any doubt of Deidara's hatred towards him, there was none, now.

How bothersome it was, not being able to fight him with his full power. Still, he had a cover to protect, even if it had been risked today.

Charging his own kekkei genkai with chakra, the young man scanned the nearby area once more, but there were no more bombs to be found.

---

The mission was over, their teacher said, and unceremoniously told them to pack their stuff and be ready to take a boat in the next ten minutes.

His blond student, who had been rooting for some action for a long while, now screeched, incensed. "What? But things just started! I heard all the noise! The village is being attacked!"

"It was being attacked, Naruto, but we took care of this. This mission ended being more dangerous than expected but, fortunately, none of you got involved."

Naruto kept his trail of loud complaints, even as Kakashi forced him to pack his possessions. Sasuke was also annoyed, but couldn't help but notice his sensei had his sharingan uncovered. If he had to use that eye, then things surely must be dangerous out there. He knew Naruto, Sakura and himself couldn't fight anything that was powerful enough to force the copy ninja to use the kekkei genkai.

Sakura was already done and had her things on her backpack. She was already by the door, waiting for the rest of the group. Sasuke suspected she was happy the mission was over. He didn't know what to make of her, really. She was smart, but really needed to work on her strength, agility, stamina… almost everything related to combat, really. But she wasn't totally useless – he was very surprised to see she had such a great chakra control, to the point Kakashi offered to find her a special tutor so she could work on genjutsu. He knew genjutsu was hard – his aniki still refused to start training him on it.

Still, her constant nagging of him was really annoying, and he couldn't help but shun her every time she started badgering him to go on a date. Why couldn't she just be normal? Or go out with Naruto? He surely would love it… the Hokage's son had his own little fan club, but Sakura had never been a part of it.

Observant as he was of his teammates and teacher right now, Sasuke realized Kakashi halt his movements and then take a long, grave look at Sakura.

The jonin left his own pack at the nearest bed and slowly made his way to her, his gaze fixed on her head. Sakura was clearly confused and took a step back. "Sensei…?" she asked, reluctantly.

Kakashi knelt in front of her, so they were eye-to-eye. Then, he shoved his hand in her hair in a quick strike, behind her right ear, and took it back in a closed fist.

"Wha…" Naruto's confused remark was lost as Kakashi's fist shone in blue light and sparks of strong and crackling lightning chakra formed in it. Something inside his hands let out a small "poof", and as he opened his fist, the thing, whatever it was, fell crumbled into brown powder to the floor.

It took a while for the disturbed Sakura to find her voice. "Sensei! What did you just do?"

Kakashi's seriousness faded away, as he pushed his mask over his unnerving sharingan and smiled in his typical friendly way, any tension swiftly forgotten.

"There was an insect in your hair. Don't worry, I took care of it!"

Kakashi ushered them away from the house and to the shore. As his young students kept pondering and whispering to themselves about whether their teacher had gone mad and started pulverizing small insects with powerful offensive ninjutsu, Kakashi sighed relieved. The last of the bombs was no more.

---

The shape of a tall man could be seen gesturing wildly as he tried to defend himself from his leader's complaints. "Damn it man, there was nothing we could do! The whole place disappeared! There was this hugeass crater still smoking in the ground, and it was a fucking pain to avoid being found by those Sky ninja!"

"Ninja from the Land of the Sky aren't remarkably strong," the disdainful voice of Sasori said, distorted by the communication jutsu.

"Oh, aren't you such a badass? Well, why don't you try to go there and have a nice chat? They're fucking bloodthirsty, I tell you. One killed a squirrel with this huge Wind tunnel jutsu, just because he thought it was the enemy! A damn squirrel!"

The Leader was clearly impatient. "I assigned this task to you both weeks ago. Was there nothing you could do until we met?"

"What the hell could we-"

"We have been searching for a new source of equipment, to no avail," Kakuzu hastily interrupted his bad-mannered partner, before the idiot condemned them both. "Sky High was the only place that provided it, at least in this side of the globe. Individual sellers would take their products there and we could choose the best. But now, we have to somehow find the manufacturers, if they're alive. Most have likely been obliterated by the attack."

The Leader looked pensive. Another member of the organization spoke. "Surely it can't be so hard to build them ourselves. Sasori?"

"Such engines are not my specialty, and I won't waste my time learning to create something that can be bought."

Leader turned to him. "You will have to, if we find no other source," and then he turned to the others, "well, Hidan and Kakuzu. Have you made any progress ever since? Forget the Sky High city."

"Most of the ninja from the hit list were captured and we raised a considerable amount of money. Additionally, we had enough time to retrieve the object you wanted."

The Leader's posture straightened, the unnerving eyes now displaying great interest. "Is that so? I feared it had been destroyed along with the city."

"Luckily enough, it was being guarded inside one of neighbor towns, a less significant one. I guess they don't place as much importance in the item as before."

"Excellent. I want you to bring it to the base immediately. Be very careful."

"We will."

"If that is all, you two are dismissed."

The partner's flickering images disappeared in unison, leaving only three people, the leader notwithstanding.

The polite voice of the most well mannered of them all was the first to speak. "Why did you call us, sir?"

"Sasori has been without a comrade for a while and thus, has not been available to complete missions. I have had my eyes in a possible partner, and the recent events in the Land of the Sky made me reach a decision."

Silence, and then, "the child from Iwagakure?"

"It is nice to see you are well informed, Sasori. Indeed, I have had my eyes on him for a long time. This past attack have proved his abilities more than ever, even if the city's destruction inconveniences us. More reason to have the boy under our command – he has been causing an uproar in the most various locations and I worry he could permanently damage one of the places of our interest."

"It is hard not to be informed about the boy, with all the commotion he's been causing, but that is it – he is just a child! A mere beginner in the ninja arts, albeit a dangerous one. You cannot expect him to be at the level of this organization, much less for me to tolerate to work with someone so young."

The Leader's eyes narrowed. "I have given the idea great thought, and this my decision. You three are to recruit the boy together. I would usually send just Sasori, but I would rather have the young man alive," and, turning back to Sasori, "have I made myself clear? Do not kill this partner. It is hard enough to find suitable people for Akatsuki."

Sasori wanted to say this was quite clear, as he was inviting some unexperienced brat to work with them, but he knew it was best to hold his tongue, right now. The Leader left. Arranging the location where they should meet before searching for the kid, the remaining three released the jutsu.

The puppeteer bitterly regretted having killed his last partner.

---

Chapter Text

The Village of the Hidden Mist. Only four years ago, this place reverberated with the sound that represented the country so well. The fresh sound of cutting, of slicing, of piercing, overwhelming, crushing with water.

Water, that used to be the strength of this Land. Its sword and shield. Here, it used to be alive. Following the commands of those who worked in order to learn its techniques and secrets, it would strengthen their warriors and terminate their enemies. What could be of Mist, without suiton? A wasteland, undoubtedly.

Yet, when confronted with the absence of their precious element, they had to find a way to survive.

Ninja who relied solely in one kind of technique were cursed to an early demise. Their legendary village learned this the hard way.

Those who refused to let go of their water jutsu weakened to the point of becoming useless. Even the most conservatives realized, as time passed and nothing changed, that their choice was adaptation or death.

The Village of the Hidden Mist. Now, it was almost devoid of any activity related to their element, as there was only a handful of warriors who had an affinity to anything but water. Taijutsu. Genjutsu. These were the remaining options for an army that wanted to last.

And Kenjutsu, of course. It used to be one of their greatest strengths, even before disgrace fell upon them. Now it was learned, developed and trained more ruthlessly than ever. Only four years of hard work, and Mist could already be considered the village of swordsmanship, the art no more carried on by only a small group of elite ninja.

Yagura left the great building where he had been supervising the blacksmiths for the past hours. This great construction used to be a place where their youngest students would learn the basic to the intermediate of suiton. Now, it was full of fire that forged metal, a mass production of weapons of the same pattern and, at the same time, the study and development of more specialized ones. They would need them.

Walking in the direction of the training fields, the young Mizukage intended to supervise the students' taijutsu drills. It was his duty as a leader to see that they would make the best of their situation.

A faint rumble made him stop and look up. Around him and his people stood very tall and thick walls. Created long ago for defense, they were also effective means to attack. These walls were not made solely of stone. They were large and accommodated a great amount of water. Circling the entire village, if it was under attack, this secret source of their element would be a great help against any foe.

But now that he thought of it, when had been the last time they had done a thorough inspection of the walls? When had they done the traditional check that would ensure they wouldn't crumble and fall apart, filled as they were with liquid?

As if to answer, the rumble became louder. One, and then two little boulders fell out of the nearest construct, and thin jets of water escaped from the newly opened holes. Cracks appeared in the walls that were, now that he thought of it, alarmingly weakened.

It was all the warning he got. Unable to stand the pressure, the walls cracked and burst into an explosion of water. The enormous torrents fell with incredible noise and strength, ruining buildings and running towards the main square, filled with ninja and civilians alike.

The shinobi present desperately started forming the familiar water seals. What Yagura recognized as a technique that once upon a time would have created a barrier with the water in the front of the flood that would have blocked the rest, predictably enough, failed. The miserable attempt did nothing but a barely visible ripple on the powerful water coming to crash upon them all.

Some of the ninja already fled, and some tried to pick a few civilians, but there was not enough time.

Or there would not be, if the Mizukage himself weren't here, by a stroke of good luck. Yagura made the same hand seals his ninja did a few moments ago, calling forth the enormous chakra that resided sealed inside of him.

Swiftly, the enormous flood stopped in its track. Docile under his control, the water followed the commands he waved with his hands. The monstrous torrent obediently separated into many smaller, but still large sized flows, and ran away, down and south, through paths that wouldn't harm anything. Soon the water was out of sight, ordered to fall down and mix with a nearby river.

All that remained was the damp earth and the few buildings that were maimed, but no true damage was done. There was no great change in the place, only on the people, who remained utterly silent.

The Mist villagers, civilian and ninja alike, looked at him with a great admiration, and, perhaps, longing? It was so rare for them to see water jutsu. Their Kage was the only one left who could properly achieve such a feat. Watching a powerful performance was a reassurance, a hope in the old power of Kirigakure and, at the same time, a painful reminder for those who lost the results of years, decades of working on and developing their skills.

The tragedy of Hidden Mist had cemented Yagura's power over it. It was quite bittersweet. But who else would the people trust to lead their village, if not the last water warrior?

Not that it was truly him. He owed it all to the demon sealed deep inside him, ever since his birth. Yes, it was thanks to being a Jinchuuriki that he could still wield their Land's revered element. Any attempts to perform water jutsu with his own chakra would be as pitiable as those of his ninja; only when reaching to Isobu's, the two tail's, chakra, could he perform as well as he did just now.

His opposition insisted in accusing him of stealing suiton techniques from the world, in order to be the only one to perform them. There was no reason he would ever do so, and no means through which he could do it. Watching Hidden Mist and Water Country struggling after losing so much power was painful for anyone who had the at least a tiny shred of loyalty for Land of Water and its village. He would do anything to restore their hold over their element.

The situation was dire and no progress was made no matter how hard they tried to gather intelligence. Still, he couldn't help but think things were going to change again soon, for better or worse.

Shaking away the thoughts that bothered him every day without fail, he started summoning ninja. Now the precarious walls were no defense for Mist, they just trapped the villagers in a giant and dangerous bowl. He would have them emptied, destroyed and rebuilt, now empty.

---

White everywhere. Known as one of the harshest places to travel to or live in the world, a position shared only with Wind Country, the Land of Frost was true to its name. The fact that it mostly lacked in elevations and cliffs was compensated by the terrible weather that was a constant.

The ground was covered in frozen water, be it deep snow or hard ice. It hid many natural traps, making it easier to climb a mountain in Earth Country than to walk through one of Frost's cold and long paths without some sort of accident. Very little could be seen in front of one's eyes, the snow disturbed by strong winds that changed directions constantly. These same strong winds discouraged any but the strongest birds to fly over, and even ninja found it difficult to travel jumping over tree branches – the trees were mostly dead or dormant, slippery with sleet and the branches ready to break if too pressured by anyone's weight.

These were only a few of the many difficulties that discouraged the rest of the world from trying to explore the Land. But it harbored, in select places, some precious and rare herbs, fruits and minerals that couldn't be found anywhere else. Unlucky ninja would be sent to accompany the medics and other specialists that travelled to retrieve such items.

Unluckier ninja would be sent to escort the rich civilians who wanted to go sightseeing what had been considered one of the "fanciest places to visit" in the world for the past decades. It became quite a convention amidst aristocrats. Only the truly rich could pay to travel in a comfortable, heated carriage maneuvered and protected by hired servants.

And right in the middle of what was the coldest country in Earth stood a beautiful and great building, that was a relief to the eyes of those who had a long travel through the frozen forests. Being painted a pure white that made it almost disappear in the scenery, it was surrounded by artificial trees of very light foliage and beautiful fountains that had heated water that would be frozen, otherwise.

This hotel was the most expensive in the whole Land, frequented only by the truly wealthy. It was a great source of income for the nation, second only to their ninja village. Newcomers would appreciate the scenery for the first time, once shielded in the comfort of the classy inn.

In the ground floor of the gorgeous construction, there was a commotion. Those were becoming quite frequent in what was once a pacific place.

"The door was here, I swear! The door to the kitchens! Thrice I tried to go through it, but would meet a solid, invisible wall! And then… there was nothing! This wall appeared in its place, and the door moved to the side!"

Some maids tried to calm the hysterical cook, while other employees looked at him skeptically.

"Really, isn't it enough that the guests started these crazy stories? Now you too, Daichi-san?" A particularly impatient maid tapped her foot and had her arms crossed, glaring disapprovingly at the hotel's chef.

"But, Kirie-chan," the agitated man protested, "they are all true! I insist, I never believed in the rumors, until this strange occurrence happened to me also! The kitchen-"

The bang of a door being violently opened and hitting the wall – not the feared kitchen door, fortunately – made the whole present staff jump. Only a look at the hotel manager was enough to create a deep silence.

"What are you doing, discussing such nonsense in this corridor? Didn't I warn you to calm our guests, and not the contrary?!"

"Sir, the door, it-"

"Yes, the door, the door disappeared," the dark skinned man repeated impatiently, "and the taps leaked blood, and the windows melted leaving holes behind, and everything else! I think I heard enough nonsense! What are you thinking, making a scandal, where one of our guests could come through…" he put a hand over his closed eyes, trying to gather some patience.

A timid touch to his arm made him look down. It was one of the waitresses that had been patting the hand of the chef, in an attempt to calm him down. "Sir… weren't you with me, when…" she shuddered, "when the cracks appeared in the third floor? When it opened below our feet? We thought we would fall, but then we blinked, and the floor was completely normal…"

The staff looked with wide and frightened eyes, even the maid that had been scolding the chef previously. If their manager confirmed it, it could only be true…

The tall man took a deep breath, as if intending to instantly deny her question. Hesitantly, however, he closed it, only to speak in a hushed and low tone.

"I was, I was. I don't know what is happening. But we must solve this problem somehow. For decades our hotel has been the safe haven for the most important nobles that visit our country. It is important even to our daimyo. We cannot allow people to become uncomfortable here. These strange events…"

"Maybe we should alert the daimyo, sir," the boy who helped with cleaning said in a calm voice. "The authorities should know-"

"Don't you dare think of it! Anyone who leaks this information is fired, you hear? Good luck trying to find a new job in Frost! I am perfectly capable of dealing with this problem without bothering our leaders!"

---

In the same hotel was a boy, unconcerned about the events that panicked almost everyone else.

His room was perfectly silent and brightened by electricity, a fancy convenience in such a remote place, but one with enough money could afford to pay a hotel with such facilities. The ample space housed a large and comfortable bed covered with blue silk, a great but mostly unused wardrobe, two soft couches that matched the bedclothes, and a spacious desk accompanied by nice chairs that made sure it was ideal to rest and study.

He opened one of the many scrolls about genjutsu that were piled over the desk. It was nothing exceptional: containing the most basic notions about the illusion techniques, any recently graduated genin could have access to these.

One would be surprised to know it was a sixteen year old ninja that was reading such elementary material. Even more surprising would be to understand the person who was so focused on the lines that usually instructed children was a powerful terrorist, whose bingo book profile had been raised to S-rank very recently after he destroyed an enormous capital with equally high ranked jutsu.

Deidara threw the document away, into a messy pile in the floor that was growing constantly. He could recite the whole thing without looking, and already had a good idea about the contents of the others. Nothing but practice would make him better. Like by getting hurt and finding no one to help he learned the basics of channeling healing chakra, only by practicing genjutsu would be he be able to counter it.

Ideally, he should have someone casting genjutsu on him while he tried to break it and vice versa, but it's not like he could find a training pal around here, or anywhere.

And that was why he frequently used his fellow patrons and even some of the hotel staff as training dummies, ever since it became obvious he would hardly make any progress inside the room. His latest performance was the door stunt, that had the senseless cook crying in desperation. He merely hid the true door and made a replica of it two meters to the right, wanting to see if he could make the illusion realistic. He had succeeded, if the large man's painful attempts to walk though the wall were anything to go by.

There goes a new person that will add to the rumors of strange endeavors in the hotel, he thought. From epidemics of mental illness to this place being haunted by the vengeful ghosts of murdered people, many tales concocted by rich civilians with nothing better to do tried to explain the strange happenings the clients here were witnessing. No one mentioned ninja. They either enjoyed dramatics or were really secluded from what happened around the world.

The blond knew his actions were imprudent, and that fooling defenseless noncombatants was nothing to gloat about, but it was still some advance considering how inept he was at the illusion techniques. Plus, their confusion was funny as hell.

A knock on the door made him stand and put on a pair of thin white gloves, quickly hiding the scrolls and putting a boring book on the art of embroidery over the desk, instead. Opening the door, he saw the friendly redheaded receptionist let out a saccharine smile. He would have thought she had a crush on him, if not for the fact he was in his old but useful woman disguise. Or maybe she's into girls, he considered, sweat dropping at the her dreamy expression.

"Kiyoshi-chan, you have mail," she squeaked happily, handing him a simple envelope.

Deidara forced out a not very convincing smile, took it and closed the door on her face none too gently. He rolled his eyes at the girls murmured "she's so shy!" he could hear through the wood.

But any annoyed thoughts about her were forgotten soon enough. No letter to Kiyoshi Maruyama should ever be sent, even by mistake, simply because she didn't exist. He regarded the envelope with a somber expression while wondering what to do with it. His hands were thankfully gloved already, and he made a clean cut on one side with a kunai. From it fell a folded paper he opened and quickly scanned with his eyes.

There, written in a bubbly calligraphy, someone asked him, or rather, his female persona, how the travel was going, and when she planned to go back home, among some other nonsense.

Not fooled by it for a second, he activated the dormant jutsu inside the letter with a series of hand signals he learned not long after becoming a missing nin. If the person who executed the jutsu was the one the letter was meant to be sent to, the true contents should appear. Exactly as expected, the friendly written gibberish dissolved and gave place to a document he was much more used to. It was the offer for a mission, of which he would receive a brief if he went to the Land of Sound until a determined date. A mere retrieval of an item, and the reward was written boldly, as anyone who hoped to hire him should do.

The blond contemplated the letter, wondering about what he should do. On one side, he doubted he could make more progress than what he already had in this hotel. He came to such a remote place in order to flee from his numerous pursuers that seemed to come from everywhere ever since Sky High and his attempt on attacking Waves. While it was good to finally break his block on illusions, there was only so much you could learn with scared people who didn't even know what a jutsu was.

The terms of the mission were annoyingly vague, but they informed him about having to meet a companion in the Land of Hot Water, that he would have to partner with before reaching Sound. It was very rare that he worked with a partner, as it was a pain to make the assignments end well with such a nuisance.

Still, refusing missions was no good for his "curriculum". A nukenin needed clients, and the payment from this one seemed good enough.

Quickly going to the reception to check out, he went back to the luxurious room for the last time, having made his decision.

Quickly packing his things, tying his hair and changing into his gear, he started erasing any ninja evidence, undoing traps and calling his sculptures back to his pouches. Looking though the window at the undoubtedly beautiful but also excruciatingly cold scenery before him, he let out a pained grimace. Vacation time was over. That was good, though, because his money wasn't infinite and, honestly, staying here for weeks only studying and messing with the heads of airheaded nobles was boring him out of his mind.

Dressing in a thick jacket he had acquired before coming, together with boots and dense trousers, he jumped from the window and outside, and disappeared in the frozen forest.

---

Minato opened one of the scrolls that had just been delivered to his desk. In front of him was one of his most trusted shinobi in the entire village. One of those who could be told secrets of the greatest danger and importance, because they were incredibly loyal, and because a leader couldn't do everything by himself.

"Please, rise and report."

The other obeyed. "As expected, the object in the Land of the Sky is gone. Initially, I believed it was destroyed in the city's explosion, but the truth is that it wasn't considered of great worth and was kept in a storage building far away from the capital. The place wasn't harmed in any way."

"It was stolen, then," the Hokage said, covering his eyes with one hand. This could be the worst thing that happened to them ever since Akatsuki got hold of the Water Lynchpin.

"Indeed. You will understand I couldn't merely ask for its whereabouts but, in a surprisingly sloppy fashion, the thief didn't care for hiding the evidence. It didn't take long to find the blood, drawn in what looks like a ritual of unknown origin."

"The triangle inside the circle? The victim…"

"Yes, that I could inquire for. Everyone knew about the death of the two caretakers, of whom there was nothing but messy remains left. It didn't have much repercussion. As I mentioned, the place was disregarded as one of little importance, and the objects inside were still cared for simply because of the small chance they would turn out to be valuable."

"Small chance, indeed," the Hokage grunted mockingly. "Land of the Sky was mostly financed by commerce, and they truly only value what can be immediately exchanged for money. A beautiful but fragile sword encrusted with jewels is considered as having a greater importance than a weapon truly useful in combat. If only they knew just how much this mere fan could be worth…"

"We can not be certain it is what we are looking for, Hokage-sama," Itachi said sensibly. The young man clearly had a steely hold over his emotions, and that made Minato force himself to control his great worry that bordered to desperation. It was unfitting for a leader.

"That is right. But if it was, we will know soon. Arrange for ninja who have a good control over fire, earth, wind and lightning ninjutsu, one of each. They aren't to leave the village in missions anymore, until further notice. Every day, three times a day, they are to perform a technique of an intermediate level with the same amount of power and precision. You are to check for any disruptions in every element... specially wind. At least for now. I will take your place, afterwards. I can't help but think you will be leaving the village for more work, soon."

"Of course, Hokage-sama." And with that, he departed. Leaf was the village of fire and, to some extent, lightning. Wind and earth were much more scarce, but they had some talented shinobi talented in these arts, fortunately. Opening one of the documents Itachi had left over his desk, he started wondering about where he should send the admittedly overworked boy to, next. It would be a great help to have more people working on the case with them, but this wasn't something he could tell just about anyone. Now, where was Kakashi?

---

"This one is not just a matter of infiltrating, it is just too big. One of us should go there and just ask for him. Pretend we are friends, or something," the tallest nin among the three suggested as they reached a very rich hotel.

"Go yourself, then. I am sure that your looks will inspire trust."

Kisame rolled his eyes at the blatant sarcasm. Sasori's usual foul mood had worsened ever since the Leader ordered them to find and recruit the boy. The shark nin couldn't understand the puppet master's anger. Kisame wouldn't mind playing babysitter to a random kid like this Deidara if it could rid him of his own bastard of a partner.

Said partner looked at the other two men with his usual look of derision. "You two complicate simple things," he said and with a quick seal, his unflattering features morphed into that of a young woman dressed in many layers of rich clothing. Kisame supposed this henge was supposed to look attractive and friendly. Still, just a look at these eyes, even while covered by the illusion that made them almond shaped and blue, disturbed him. They always did.

Shrugging, he dutifully changed himself into a tall white man in a dark suit, his Samehada altered to look like a great backpack. The non cooperative Sasori stayed back, hidden among frozen trees, as the partners made their way to luxurious inn.

"We are looking for a boy-", Kisame started as soon as they reached the reception, just to be interrupted by his comrade's waving hand.

"No, no, no. This poor man here never knows who we're talking about, isn't that right, Ichiro-kun," the disguised Orochimaru corrected Kisame, who just raised an eyebrow. "Forgive him, he is a new bodyguard. I'm looking for my sister. Poor thing is travelling by herself, she is, but she will be so happy to see us. You see, she just wanted to have a little adventure by herself, but she's been away for so long. I am worried."

The way the snake nin could perform a girly lady so well only made him more disturbing at Kisame's eyes. Still, if this worked, he wouldn't complain.

"It is not our policy to give away our guest's info," the man behind the counter stated. He looked strangely disturbed and unquiet, but it would be impossible for him, who clearly was no ninja, to notice a henge as powerful as theirs. Even most shinobi wouldn't. What could be troubling him?

Orochimaru looked disappointed. "Oh, surely you would make us an exception? She would be so incommoded to know she could have met her sister but did not."

The man scratched his head, looking conflicted between obeying protocol and pleasing the pretty dark haired woman in front of him. In the end, the last option clearly won. "Well, if you will just tell me her name…"

Now, there was a problem. Surely Deidara wouldn't have used his real name. They were in a bit of a pickle, and Kisame decided to let Orochimaru deal with it.

However, it was not needed, as another receptionist, a friendly looking redhead, looked at his partner with a knowing eye.

"With such a pretty face, I'm sure you are looking for Kiyoshi-chan! You two have the same eyes!"

The man, who looked like her supervisor, turned sharply to her. "Don't you talk about our guests in such a familiar way!" and, turning back to Orochimaru and Kisame, "I am very sorry…"

"Yes, yes, forgive me! It is just that Kiyo- I mean, Maruyama-san is such a friendly girl. Even being mute, the poor thing, she surely treats everyone nicely…"

As the man turned once more to reprimand her, Kisame and Orochimaru exchanged thoughtful looks. So, Kiyoshi Maruyama. But mute? At any rate, now it was clear that Orochimaru had made sure his henge had a face that looked very much like Deidara's. Kisame didn't notice before, as he had only seen the boy's face once or twice in the bingo book, but this was quite smart of that old snake.

"That is right! Can I talk to Kiyoshi-chan?"

The girl opened the guest book and looked at it thoroughly. After checking the same page thrice, she turned back at them with a disappointed frown. "I'm so sorry… it looks like she isn't here anymore. She checked out three days ago. It wasn't my turn, so I didn't see her out."

Orochimaru's henge set on a sad expression. "Ah, what a pity! Would you know where she went? No? Of course not, well, thank you for your help!"

The partners left the hotel. Kisame let the henge fall as soon as they were once again covered by the cold forest. Sasori's bent form appeared from the same place they left him at.

"So? Not there, either?"

"Was here for the past weeks, I saw it on the guestbook," Orochimaru answered, "but left three days ago. What a bother."

Indeed, they had travelled through this very hostile weather and searched in every hotel in the Land, this one being the last. While they got some useful information, it was annoying to have tracked the boy until this place just to know he had left.

"Three days of distance aren't much for the like of us. Still, haven't you done anything else? Gathered any information, looked at the room he was at? I want to get to him soon. We shouldn't be wasting our time chasing the little idiot."

Kisame almost felt bad for the boy who would have to tolerate Sasori for a partner. That is, if the youngster lived long enough to tell the tale. But he agreed with the puppeteer, they should finish this search as soon as possible.

"That's what I want to talk about – just now, Samehada felt some traces of his chakra. The same we felt in the southern forests last week. This kid probably doesn't know how to hide it."

"The past week? Didn't the guestbook say he checked in almost a month ago?"

Kisame shrugged. Maybe the lad took a nice joyride in the forest? "It is the only clue we have. That will have to do."

"What an amateur," the Sand nukenin criticized in a voice that managed to sound even more scornful than usual. "And to think he is classified as S-class. He will not last long, and not because of my interference."

"You're right. They're ranking anyone up nowadays," Orochimaru said, shaking his head and crossing his arms. "It isn't such a privilege to be a Special Class anymore."

Kisame sighed in frustration and turned his back on the two men, but not before adding in a tone that came out like a plead, "Orochimaru-san, would you drop your henge now, please?"

---

Deidara couldn't believe it took him almost a week to reach the Land of Hot Water. Getting out of Frost had been even harder than the already hellish trip he made when trying to get in, and, at that time, his chakra was halved and his wounds, barely healed. Who would have known the weather could get even worse?

As soon as the climate became less and less cold and the sun could be seen again, he made sure to travel with his bird. He had missed flying so much. It was one of the most liberating parts of his talent and after the painful past days, he felt he would never want to touch the ground again.

Yet, it was easy to warm up for the new place he was at. Hot Water had a welcoming environment, the nature green once again. The troublesome and heavy winter clothes had been quickly discarded, only to, unfortunately, give place to his feminine disguise.

He certainly didn't want to meet his new partner in such an attire, but it had been made clear to him he would find them inside the town. With no description of this person whatsoever, he could only hope they would recognize him.

Buying some supplies and walking around, he quickly spotted a place of interest. A beautiful building stood at the center of the town. It was enormous and so decorative he only knew it was the Hot Springs main hotel because he had seen it before. Having gone through the Land of Hot Water many years ago on a mission, not with his old team but with his Explosion Corps tutors, he saw a glimpse of it and only hoped he could get inside. The task, as per usual, had been a pain. Rock wouldn't let go of even half a coin without extreme necessity and they would always sleep outside, rarely renting rooms, even when they were perfectly safe. He got hurt in a miscalculated attack – he was no prodigy at seven years old – and had only hoped to be able to rest in a comfortable place, for once. Instead, they had him sleeping on his hurt back in the forest, and once he got back to Rock, he found his usually hard bed extremely comfortable.

Well, this time, he would enjoy himself until he found whoever he had to work with. Trying to ignore the voice in his mind that accused his recent expensive habits – the rich hotel in Frost had been the only option outside their Hidden Village, but there were many simpler, cheaper but still nice places around here – he decided to check in the extravagant looking inn, famous for having a connection to the best hot springs around.

After leaving his things in the room that was quite nice, he went down to the bathing area. The warmth was incredibly inviting for him, as he could swear his bones were still frozen from the difficult travelling. Changing into a comfortable robe, he tied his hair up and discreetly went to the men's side. His disguise could take him only so far, and he would make sure to remain unnoticeable.

After almost an hour of a nice soaking that made him feel better than he had in a long time, he got out and waited for the people to leave the corridor, so he could enter the women's changing stalls without being noticed, as there was where he had left his clothes. After having done so, he was approached by another person.

The woman in front of him was taller than him, as most adults still were, and clearly on her mid twenties. She was fully dressed, and looked like she had yet to go to the Hot Springs. Her clothes were much cheaper looking than those of everyone around here. Her head was full of blond hair of a very light and opaque color, dry, messy and incredibly frizzy, some lone strands poking the air as if electrified. Her eyes were hidden by very thick glasses, and her posture was one of slight embarrassment. "What is it?"

She presented herself. He was surprised to learn that this woman, Shiho, was his new partner, making him wish dearly that this was one of those cases where appearance could be deceiving, because she surely didn't look like much.

"Let's just go to my room," he spoke in a low tone, for his voice was just the thing he couldn't fake. She raised an eyebrow but he just ignored her and went ahead, expecting to be followed.

As soon as the door closed, Deidara threw himself on the bed gracelessly, and looked at the woman from his sprawled position.

"What an expensive taste you have. Specially with many cheaper places in this town."

Deidara ignored her and went straight to the point. "The only thing I know about this mission is that we are to take something from somewhere and give it to someone. Not much to work with, mm, so please elaborate."

Shiho must have been amused, Deidara thought, regarding what looked like a young woman in beautiful clothes of a blue butterfly pattern speaking in such a masculine tone and scratching an itch over her – his ribs.

She cast a complicated privacy jutsu that was quite useful but he never learned, mostly because of disinterest, he had to admit, and started talking.

"I don't know many of the details, myself. The client wanted both of us present before he would speak. Then again, you have been working at random assignments for long enough to know that asking for too much information will get you 'fired'. This person wants something of his back, and he will tell us the location. We are to work together to retrieve it as soon as possible, and the payment was specified to you in a message, I am sure, or you wouldn't be here."

Deidara snorted. "Something of his back, huh?"

"Well, of course this is most likely thievery than recovering. He could hire the legal services of a hidden village and pay a considerably smaller fee, otherwise. But don't tell me you are squeamish about stealing."

The boy rolled his eyes. "No way. What I don't get is why I have to work with you. I have been underestimated many times before and, because of that, the stupid clients would force me to work with a team. But after Sky High, I thought people would learn I can do my job by myself with no problems, yeah."

She didn't even blink at his blatant dismissal of her presence. "Not everything is about destroying what is in between you and your goal. The client wants to be sure his item will not get destroyed. Infiltration is one of my specialties and you will be with me to overwhelm any powerful ninja who may try to oppose us."

His blue eyes narrowed, clearly disdaining her weakness but once again she would display no reaction to him. Bored and not only a little annoyed at the sermon of subtlety and control, he propped himself up in the many comfy pillows, ready to call this a day. "Fine, fine. We travel tomorrow then, right? What an annoyance. See ya, then."

And for the first time, she huffed exasperatedly. "Of course not. We are to depart right now. You look like you are in a perfect physical condition, and do remember we have a deadline-"

"No way," he was quick to interrupt. "I just got back from a travel through Frost. Do you know what time of the year it is? It was a fucking pain. I've got to rest, yeah. And this deadline is far away."

"It is not! We are already quite out of time as it is!"

"Shut up. I'm staying, and that's it. And so are you, 'cause he won't hire you if I'm not there too, right?" He smirked maliciously. "Unless you can't stay here. It is expensive, and I have no idea of how you even managed to enter. But as you wisely pointed out to me before, there are many cheaper places to stay around, so do you mind?" and then he pointed to the door, and raised an eyebrow when she didn't move. "I'm not paying for you or letting you share this room, if you're wondering."

Finally insulted enough, Shiho hastily agreed they would meet tomorrow morning before the sun rose, opened the door and walked away closing it behind with a bang, deactivating the privacy jutsu. Deidara summoned some of his creations and had them fill many hidden spaces in the room, and then turned the lights off and went to sleep. Before the sun rose? Right.

---

Zetsu observed the jonin team running close to where he was. In a few seconds, they would be right in front of him. Of course, they couldn't see him. But one of them would, soon.

Just as the group passed besides the tree he was merged with, he threw one of the small fruits in one of the ninja's – the masked one's – head.

It was cautious enough that they all kept going with no reaction, but he knew he wouldn't have to wait for long.

Sure enough, no more than a couple of minutes had passed when he could see the masked man coming back, having gotten rid of his teammates. He probably told them he had forgotten something. That happened frequently enough no one would question it.

"Zetsu-san?" He asked with a confused voice, quite a bit far away from the tree Zetsu was at. The plant man felt an urge to sigh. Was that guy a jonin or not? But he knew Tobi's abilities were good enough to grant him such a rank, even if did some… weird mistakes.

Zetsu knew his old teammate very well.

"In here," he said, materializing from the tree's trunk and finally getting separated from it, stepping on the ground.

"Zetsu-san!" Tobi exclaimed happily and ran towards him. For a moment, he was afraid he would be hugged, but the excited Grass shinobi managed to just jump a little, clearly excited. "I've missed you so much!"

And it was so strange, but Zetsu believed it. He didn't care much for the village he left behind, and didn't scratch his headband – he merely left it fall somewhere, never to be found again. But there was this person that was almost close to being called a friend, this still active Grass ninja.

Not that Tobi was loyal to Kusagakure. He was using his position in the village, but would most likely have to leave, soon. There was only so much you could do without being caught.

"Have you found the object?" Zetsu asked, preferring not to answer Tobi's previous statement.

"Oh, oh yes!" Tobi said eagerly, but he seemed a little… nervous? "It was right where you said it would be! The old house, who would know? It was super easy to get it! I didn't even have to ask anyone for permission."

"That's good. Congratulations. Where is it?"

"In my apartment, Zetsu-san. It looks quite good in the nightstand. Are you sure you need it? It doesn't look very magical."

The tall Akatsuki tried to calm himself, even after hearing Tobi had put an object that could very well be the Earth Lynchpin as a decoration besides his bed. No one should know about it, so no one should try to get it. Still, it wouldn't do to have to risk things more than he already had. "Yes, I am very sure. I need you to bring it to me as soon as possible."

"Ooh. Okay, then," he sounded disappointed. "Just a minute, Zetsu-san. I will be back in a pinch."

"Please use a storage scroll," Zetsu's black side felt the need to say. He didn't think even Tobi would decide to carry the thing on his arms and in front of everyone, but who knew?

"Oh, but of course, Zetsu-san," Tobi said waving a finger admonishingly, as if such a thing were obvious. Zetsu was relieved. "Ah, by the way!"

"What is it?"

"When can I join Akatsuki?"

Oh, no. That, again. "Sasori of the Red Sand's partner has died-"

"Oh, YES!"

"But a new partner has been chosen. He must be in the Headquarters, by now."

Tobi's posture wilted in a pitiful fashion. Zetsu honestly didn't think the man would ever be able to join. No matter what he said, he didn't truly understand what the organization was about.

"When will I have my chance?" Tobi whined.

"Go get the puzzle!" his black side, who usually spoke much less to Tobi said, clearly losing his patience.

"Oh, yes! Leave it to me! I will just reassemble it and give it back to you soon. It is a very hard puzzle, so it might take a while."

As Tobi ran to the village, Zetsu started feeling the overwhelming wish to bang his head against some hard surface. What had been on his mind when he asked Tobi, of all people, to take care of such a task? If even one of the pieces went missing, he would be searching for Kami knew how long.

---

"Are you sure this is the place?"

Kisame had his sword pointed towards a building, even though it looked more like it was the sword that was guiding his arm. "Positive. The chakra is the same, only it feels stronger now. He must be here."

"Let us do it fast, then. We don't want the boy to escape," Orochimaru said, stepping forward. Already sporting the same henge of days ago, he took the lead. Kisame also disguised himself with a quick hand seal and Sasori, always the unhelpful one, stayed behind… not that they needed him for this, but still. They were dealing with a terrorist, here. It would be nice of Sasori to be available to use his puppet strings and stop the boy before he even started.

"Now, really," Orochimaru's voice, now a feminine one, could be heard as they entered the great building. "The child has expensive tastes. This extravagant hotel with the best hot springs in the Land of Hot Water? I heard about it. Rich politicians, merchants, even daimyō and, if rumors are true, the Third Raikage have visited this place. It looks like Akatsuki is going to have a new fundraiser."

The shark nin had to agree – this Deidara was likely used to a very high profile lifestyle. He was starting to get curious about the boy who posed as a travelling rich mute girl and apparently was a verywell paid missing nin. Then again, he did terminate Sky High City.

Well, his curiosity wouldn't last long. They had finally reached his location, and surely would be able to seize him now-

"I'm sorry," the receptionist said as soon as Orochimaru asked for a Kiyoshi Maruyama, "but she left this morning. At seven A.M., I believe. This would make it nine hours ago."

"Are you certain? Was she a blonde girl?"

"Yes, dear, and she looked very much like you! I know we're talking about the same person."

After checking that no, they didn't know the direction Deidara took, Kisame left the building and started checking the area around, as Orochimaru stayed and discreetly checked the room that was still so fresh with the boy's chakra they didn't need to use Samehada to detect it. Both came back after a short while, done with the inspection.

"So?" Sasori's impatient voice inquired, annoyed at having his companions coming back without the blond Rock ninja who was being such a trouble.

Orochimaru leaned in the nearest tree. "I checked the room thoroughly. There was nothing left that could indicate where Deidara-kun went to. It was quite womanly though, to a strange extent."

Sasori rolled eyes that, in Kisame's opinion, looked quite dead. "He is posing as a woman. What did you expect?"

"Of course, I understand. But upon a full inspection, I realized there was a certain… use… of feminine hygiene products, I will say, that seemed unnecessary, even for a pretense. There were these used tampo-"

"Well, isn't he thorough with his disguise?" Kisame interrupted hastily, not interested in talking about women's intimate products, or the snake sannin scrutinizing a bathroom trashcan. "Kudos for him, would have fooled anyone. But really, let's get him. We are all fast and he left just this morning. We will catch him for sure, this time. Today, even. Samehada pointed me to the direction he took."

No one protested, wanting to get rid of this business, fast. Kisame was usually a very good tracker, and Orochimaru and Sasori weren't bad, themselves, so it was unusual to take so long to reach a target.

---

He finally understood why Shiho was so adamant they would depart soon. She was slow. He wanted to run away from the most populated areas before taking on his usual method of transportation, and made sure to point out every two minutes or so how she was holding him back. Her eyebrow twitched once or twice, but that was it. Most of her angry outbursts had been wasted when he finally deemed to appear to their departing point, at nine in the morning and no less.

Worried about how close they were to the border to the Land of Fire, he had them stop for a while behind a rocky hill, saying he detected something. Shiho eventually felt a patrol's nearby presence, too, and they stayed still for a while, waiting for the appropriate moment to go back to their run.

"I'm surprised with how you detected the Leaf ninja from so far away," she said after some minutes of silence, looking genuinely surprised. Really, he was an artist, but he was also a ninja, and knew how to survive.

Of course, she didn't know how he had clay birds fly along with them from varied angles and distances to detect the enemy's presence, so she must think he was some awesome kind of sensor-type. "Yeah, yeah. They've been pissed off at me for a long time. I've got to concentrate on avoiding them unless I want to leave a huge smoking crater around here, too." Not such a bad idea, the restrained artist inside him wanted to argue. All that time without any kind of combat and he could feel his chakra, full to the brim, itching.

"Regular shinobi are a danger to any nukenin," she said, while touching something inside a pocket. The sound he heard was of a nail scratching metal, and then he thought she most likely hid her ninja headband there.

"Yeah, but for me it's worse. The bigger the jobs you do, the most they want your head."

"Is that why you hid in Frost for such a long time?"

He sent her a suspicious – and frankly annoyed – stare. He didn't hid. Well, not completely. He was also working with genjutsu. With pitiable civilians, some part of him whispered inside of his mind, and he silenced it forcefully. "What's it to you? And how do you know I was there?"

"You told me yesterday you came back from a long travel to the Land of Frost. As for how I knew you stayed there hiding, I didn't, for sure, but come on. If you were active, I would have heard of more terrorism. Frost seems quite fine, nothing of importance happened there recently."

"Since you know so much, then you also must know Sky and Leaf want me dead, no matter what. They are those who don't even care for the reward money, they just want me to cease existing, and they're much worse. Because they won't change targets when they see someone with a higher price on their head, like a bounty hunter."

The days he spent fleeing from Waves were still fresh on his memory. Hurt and with a considerably part of his chakra depleted, he had to be very careful. He had been much worse than this many times before, but it didn't change the fact that there were many enemies looking for him right now, and one of them could know how to stop his technique.

To his right, only sea, and there was no point on going that way. He would either stop at the island near Fire, that was quite small and hard to hide in, or keep going East until he reached Land of Water and the violent Mist Village, where, in his state, he would suffer a painful death, and perhaps have his shreds sent back to Iwagakure in a box.

To his left, Land of Rivers, home to Hidden Valleys Village. Not very hostile, and surely nothing if compared to the Five Great Nations. Quite tempting, to go there. But that meant staying in a place that was surrounded by Land of Fire and Land of Wind. Hidden Rain was quite aggressive itself and, while he hadn't attacked it anywhere ever, the entire world already considered him a threat.

Indeed, the only plausible path of action seemed to be to go northeast and stay at Land of Hot Water. Their Hidden Village didn't exist anymore, priding itself on forgetting wars and focusing on commerce, instead. He would have time to recover there and, if followed, he could always flee to the neighboring Land of Frost, one of the best places for someone who wanted to disappear.

Of course, that would mean having to cross the Land of Fire.

Now that the adrenaline and most of the rage left away, the wounds that he thought merely annoying before reminded him of their existence through painful waves. It was worse than he thought. When he finally decided to take a small pause from looking for enemies to take a look at himself, he noticed the warm blood was slowly but continually seeping through his clothes. Some was already on his bird, and he knew he had to stop it before it fell down.

If people were after him before, they were sniffing like bloodhounds now, ever since Sky High.

His limited medical knowledge was enough to stop the bleeding, but he didn't have the level of control it would take to heal while still controlling the bird. Landing was out of question, specially near the borders, where patrols were intense.

Relying on the fact that he usually flew over the most well guarded of places undetected, being nothing more than a tiny and distant bird for anyone who looked to the sky, he decided to hold on until he reached Hot Water. He had been through worse, and he still had about half of his explosive chakra, and most of his normal one. He just had to stay over the clouds, and everything would be well.

That's when the enemies approached, flying high in the sky.

One hour and a half later, the last of his opponents fallen, Deidara stumbled and almost gave up to the temptation of resting in the dirty floor that looked terribly comfortable. But he had to go, and now. They had managed to contact their allies and, if every one of them possessed a machinery monstrosity of their own, they would be here fast.

Land of Sky must have Fire's cooperation, otherwise they wouldn't have been able to do air patrol – mechanical flying devices would call the attention of anyone who looked up, unlike his clay creation. That meant they would have Konoha's help and, in a fight, he couldn't count on the two hidden villages fighting against each other as an opportunity to flee.

His normal chakra was almost completely depleted now, any chance of healing his wounds gone. The adrenaline, still running through him, didn't let him feel most of the pain, but things were bad. Now the prospect of being able to reach Hot Water stopped being a certainty and started looking more and more like a delusional fantasy.

Reaching for his pouch, he realized it was not there anymore. Cursing, he started searching in the mess around him, finally finding it hanging from a tree branch. It was in a bad state, mostly ripped apart. Hands trembling, he opened it carefully, already fearing the chance of meeting only white pieces of what was once his means of transportation.

But there it was, miraculously enough, the statue – not harmed, fortunately, and quite ready to fly. He wasted no time on expanding it and jumping over it, a bit clumsily, admittedly. Fortunately, it was controlled by his kekkei genkai chakra, of which he still had about a half of his reserves.

He wanted to reach a great height as fast as possible and up he went, almost at a completely vertical path, but he didn't trust his hands to hold on the hawk strongly enough. Waiting for that moment where he would be once more above the clouds and then at least a little safer, he could only hope there would be no more disturbances.

But of course there were. Right before reaching the border to Hot Water he found himself surrounded again, now by Leaf ninja. He was truly tired and didn't even see the fire jutsu before it damaged his bird and he crashed in the ground. Wounds getting even worse, his only luck was that the ninja who tried to kill him this time were far below the level he had been fighting again this night. He ripped parts of what was left of his last creation to make smaller bombs, the kekkei genkai chakra the only usable energy he had left, now. After being forced to used whatever was left of his regular chakra to hid with the help of an earth jutsu, he found himself stumbling clumsily in the shadier parts of Hot Water, barely aware of where he was going to.

Finally, he collapsed in the middle of a forest. It was through mere luck he wasn't found. After regaining a bit of his energy, he started a slow and not very efficient healing process. His pouch only had money now, but it was worthless if he could be identified. It took him days to recover enough so that he could make clay out of the raw earth near a river he would collect in the night. Having enough to feel almost comfortable once again, but still weakened and hurt, he knew it was only a matter of time before he was ambushed again.

After that, he travelled to Frost and finally found an use for the still great amount of money from the destruction of the city, staying in the expensive hotel no ninja went to, and focusing on studying genjutsu to a radical degree, since he couldn't for the life of him imagine how that man had managed to kill his creations in the Land of Waves.

He knew was much better now. Never again would he walk around with nothing less than his full capacity of clay, and he was more than ready to fight. If it came to it, he wouldn't mind a good battle. It had been too long.

However, he was still interested in doing this new mission so, instead of catching the attention of the patrols like he wanted to – maybe he would find one of those who almost killed him a month ago and give them a taste of what it was like to fight him at full power – he opened one of the dreaded genjutsu scrolls, now a mid level one. Also having studied this one many times, he could understand the theory quite well, but materializing it in true action was what seemed impossible.

"That's a low level genjutsu technique," the woman's voice came from where she now stood, two meters above him. His left eye twitched.

"What's it to you?" he had to ask for the second time that day. Couldn't she just stay silent?

"It is just that you are a powerful ninja and this scroll is almost at elementary level. I can't believe you are entertaining yourself by reading it. Surely you have these genjutsu techniques mastered?"

Bothered more than he wanted to admit, he decided to firmly ignore her. Maybe she was trying to measure his strengths and weaknesses in order to plan for the mission, but why in the world would he reveal such things to a stranger?

As if knowing he wouldn't continue the conversation by himself, she continued, "do you have difficulties with genjutsu? It is surprising, for you have an excellent chakra control, being able to make your bombs. You would have died by now, if you couldn't control your energy properly. So what is it?"

Deidara angrily closed the scroll and threw it in his backpack, closing it with a snap, before standing up and deciding to leave. He would make sure to run at a fast pace. Maybe trying to keep up with his speed with her pitiful stamina would teach her a lesson.

"Wait!" her voice, which was quickly becoming one of the sounds he most hated, said, "It is not secure yet, right? Don't go out!"

And he had to admit she was right. Even without his creations scattered around, he would be able to know this was too soon, the enemies were still close. But maybe he should just come out in the open and end their lives with a bang. He wouldn't work with a partner ever again. It was too troublesome.

A mental review of his money reserves made him rethink, though. Developing his techniques usually cost him quite a lot, as it was hardly a matter of molding clay and infusing chakra senselessly. It was all about fine research and that required good materials and information. And if he wanted extensive training on genjutsu and discover what kind of technique had stopped his sculptures, he would have to spend quite a bit, too.

Sitting down with a frown but now more frustrated than angry, he crossed his arms and legs and closed his eyes, sensing every one of his bombs nearby. There was a group of people moving close to the one 500 meters to southeast, and until he could feel no one anymore, he would stay put. It was merely a matter of concentrating on the perimeter-

"Genjutsu is not this hard, you know."

Kami, he was going to kill her.

"Shut. Up."

"Because the problem is always lack of chakra control, and you're quite fine, aren't you?"

"Whatever, be quiet!"

"Or maybe you just hate the technique? If that's the case, you could just learn to protect yourself from it."

"Why, you make that sound so easy. If that were so, everyone would be immune to genjutsu by now, huh!"

"Blind people aren't affected to most kinds of genjutsu, because it is truly applied with focus on the eyes. It is very hard to find a shinobi talented enough to apply it directly to the brain and even then, if your eyes can't see illusions, the images of what you can truly see and what they're forcing you to see will clash. It would be confusing, but at least you would be able to know you're trapped, every time."

Well, that made some sense. And it wasn't like she was going to quit chattering any time soon, so it would be best to extract some scraps of useful info from her, if he could.

"How to translate this into something useful, mm?" he had an idea, but wanted to let her work it out.

"Why, some people train specific parts of their bodies to do something. To be impenetrable, or to be able to manipulate chakra just like so. Similar to the Explosion Release from your village. The most common technique is the one where explosions come out from your hands, without any hand seal. Why not from somewhere else? Well, hands seem more practical. So someone created this technique so it would be easier to manipulate the explosion from your hands. If you try doing it from other body part without preparation, it could cause damage, even rip parts off."

He was surprised at how correct she was being at it all, and remembered the painful times when he tried to create explosions from parts of his body other than his hands. He was fortunate not to be crippled. By now, he had a good hold over such techniques, but it didn't make what she said less true.

"So basically, I should train my eyes, then, to counter genjutsu."

"Yes, it is possible. Very risky, too, so you should think before doing it. If it were easy, everyone would be immune to genjutsu by now, you said. And that is true. Why won't more people try to train their eyes to automatically see through illusions?"

"Because most of them would end up blind," he answered quickly. Like he almost lost his hands when accidentally creating the mouths in his palms. Wasn't his life a constant trade? He was always taking risks with his body in order to grow in power. This wouldn't be any different, and he knew how to break genjutsu… the hard part was to know when he was under it. So training his eyes would mean having them instantly reject the illusion, by disrupting it as soon as it took effect. Maybe…

And as he thought deeply in the matter, she kept silent. Had he felt more suspicious, he would have wondered more on why she was helping him so. As it was, he was too interested in learning how to counter genjutsu without actually learning how to perform the thing. So immerse he was in planning, Shiho had to tap his shoulder and ask if they could depart now. After being unable to find any enemies nearby, he decided to do so, and they ran towards Sound once more. It wouldn't be long before they reached their objective.

---

And once more in this mission that was becoming disconcertingly long and challenging to the powerful trio, the three Akatsuki members stood in a building where they hoped to find their elusive target. Only now they were hidden, and waiting for him. Orochimaru had half a mind to teach the boy a lesson, whether he agreed to come with them or not. Maybe he would learn more about Rock Village's interesting bloodline limit with some of his more painful laboratory experimentations.

As Kisame said in the Land of Hot Water, they were able to catch the boy quite quickly. They didn't actually see him, but felt his chakra close enough to know they could capture him in a moment.

So they were very surprised to receive a call from the Leader right in the middle of the chase. They thought about capturing Deidara first, but that could be a little problematic, and no one ignored the Leader for too long. Knowing that, they stopped in their tracks as Kisame answered the summons. He opened his eyes after a mere couple of minutes, to tell his companions their new orders for now.

It seemed like the person who hired Deidara was none other than the Sound Daimyo. The man hired Akatsuki quite frequently for the most varied demands, from escorting to stealing and even to threat and kill his enemies.

While there was nothing new about that, what caught the Leader's attention long ago was the fact that the Daimyo once asked them to retrieve a particular item. One that, at the time, didn't have any meaning to them, but ever since the discovery that changed the organization's objectives…

The fact is that the man seemed strangely obsessed with that item, to the point of paying an exorbitant amount just in order to have it intact. And it fit the criteria for the items they had searching for, themselves.

It could be a mere coincidence. Sound wasn't very influent and while the man was rich, he was hardly powerful enough to be privy of such a secret. Yes, he most likely valued the first object he asked for as the item for a collection. But ever since, the Leader had Zetsu watching the leader of Sound periodically.

And the thing was, the Daimyo was after one more of these items. One Akatsuki had its eyes on, for a long time.

So they received instructions to go to the same direction Deidara was going to, making sure he wouldn't be able to notice it. They were to reach the Daimyo first and interrogate him. If they came to the conclusion the man knew nothing, he would be left alone, and the trio would wait for Deidara, who wouldn't be able do this mission anyways.

Now having a clear objective and out of the oppressive forests of Frost, they reached the place in a record time. There was no hesitation or deception: they entered from the main doors, and were quickly ushered to the Daimyo's office. Most of the servants already knew who they were.

The man jumped when he saw them. Kisame had to wonder whether it was because he felt guilty or merely because a random visit from Akatsuki couldn't be a good thing.

After clearing his throat and embarrassedly putting the chair he dropped when he stood up all of a sudden back to its place, the man greeted them with a semblance of calm, but it was clearly a pretense.

"What a surprise. To see you here, I mean. Do you want tea?"

Ignoring his question, Kisame went straight to the point. He knew he would have to speak for the group, as he was the one who understood the situation better.

"We heard you just hired a missing nin for a mission. Deidara from Iwagakure, right?"

The man didn't look surprised. It was like he had been worried about this question ever since they entered. "Ah, I mean… I mean no insult to Akatsuki, of course not… you've always worked very well. But it is a small job, you see, so I decided to hire a group… a person, of less importance, you see?"

Orochimaru stepped forward. "The boy levelled cities to the ground. He just destroyed the greatest trading market in the world, and is currently considered the top choice for quick devastation, charging enormous fees for every job done. How is he of less importance?" Well, someone had done his homework. Kisame looked surreptitiously at Sasori, but the man didn't seem impressed by Deidara's portrayal by the Sannin.

"He-he works with bombs," the man squeaked unseemly, having lost any grips in his emotional state. "It makes sense, doesn't it? For destruction? It is better than just have ninja go and attack everyone…"

"But you didn't want to destroy anything. You asked him to retrieve a certain thing."

"It… it was…"

Maybe he expected them to be bluffing? Well, if the Leader was right, then they knew what the man wanted.

"You want him to go to Lightning and take the Amber Purifying Pot for you, right? It is used in some ceremonies of their religion. We know that because we've had our eyes on it for some time, you see, so we know where it is, what it is used for…"

And Kisame stopped, because just as he said that, the man paled until he was white as paper. His trembling ceased and so did the stuttering, and he was deadly still.

"Hey," Kisame started. It wouldn't do to have the man die right now. Or maybe it would, but the Leader still wanted answers.

"So, I was right. It is what I was looking for, right?" the Daimyo asked in a lifeless voice. "Who would have thought… it is one of them, one of the links…!"

Kisame raised an eyebrow. Gotcha. "Is it so? I was going to say it is used to seal people inside. Looks like the wielder just has to call your name, and if you answer, goodbye, inside you go. I never knew whether to believe it or not. But the Leader will be pleased to know he is on the right track."

With that, he started advancing, unsheathing his sword. Orochimaru raised an eyebrow, clearly wondering what they were talking about, but said nothing. Sasori merely observed.

"Wait, wait! I don't know what you are talking about! I merely wish to have it as the item of my collection, I won't-"

"I apologize, Kimura-san, but you just know too much."

The man screamed and tried to flee through the window, but it was for naught. Before he could even reach it he was slayed, and not even one of the many drops of blood managed to fall outside.

"The Leader was right, then. What a bother," Kisame said, arranging Samehada back on its position on his back. "Now, we got to wait for the brat, right? Let's hide. No need to take care of the body. It doesn't matter what he sees once he is inside of here."

---

Deidara and Shiho continued their travel with no more problems, avoiding a possible enemy or two, but with no meaningful stops. Once close to the border of Sound, he decided to use his bird to fly the rest of the way. They had mostly travelled by foot, unfortunately, but if he could hasten their arrival, he would.

The woman lost her cool as soon as they were high in the sky. He could understand, having felt the same exhilaration the first time he flew… but she would never feel like he would, being able to control the movements, to create the means of transportation. It was liberating.

A few minutes were enough for them to reach the building. He had to pry her hands off his jacket finger by finger, but couldn't help but be pleased by her great smile… even if he couldn't see if her eyes reflected it, hidden as they were behind the horrendous glasses.

"Let's go, yeah. We're finally here," he said, and started walking towards the building. In a few instants she was by his side.

The place was one of the few good looking ones in Sound. The other buildings were decent, but nothing extravagant. Every time he visited a client he would be in a different environment, and this was the same. This was a mansion with servants, portraits and random ugly vases propped in pedestals here and there. Not the businesslike atmosphere he expected.

The man's servants – he was the Daimyo, apparently, and Deidara felt reassured he would be able to pay the inflated amount promised in the letter – were quick to direct them when he not too subtly said what they were there for. They seemed quite nervous. He knew most civilians who lived outside ninja villages felt uncomfortable near shinobi, but this was ridiculous. They were cowardly and would avert their eyes as soon as they saw him.

He would have thought this was because of his terrorism, but they treated Shiho the same way, and Kami knew you had to have a problem to find the weird woman intimidating.

They went to the main room as directed by a young woman who ran away as soon as they understood where they had to go to. Shiho knocked on the door, but there was no answer. She knocked once more, with the same results, and frowned. It looked like she was going to try yet again, but Deidara slapped her hand away, forcing the door open – actually, it was opened already – and it hit the wall inside loudly. He turned the lights on, but there was no need to do so. The smell that hit him was enough to tell the tale.

Sprawled on the floor was the man who had to be their client. He lied in a dark pool of blood, clearly still fresh, that slowly ran through the floor and hit the furniture.

Shiho looked speechless. Deidara went to the man and kicked him to the side, and grimaced at the ugly picture.

The Daimyo looked like he was ran through many blades. Not a clean cut, or two, but many ragged cuts, he was actually ripped apart, many times… as if he had been killed with an enormous grater. The face, however, was intact.

"This is… the client, indeed," his companion said with a grave face. They in silence for a while, but the Rock nukenin was the first to break it.

"There goes our payment, huh. Can't believe I travelled all this way for nothing. Shit," he kicked the body again, hiding the damaged parts once more.

"I wonder who did this," Shiho said, clearly recovering – as was expected of any decent ninja. "I don't recognize these cuts."

"Not too strange, mm. He is a powerful man in a powerless country… not like he had the best guards around, we just had to walk in to see him. Maybe this person he was going to have us steal from got wind of his plans and decided to put an end to it all before it started. Whatever," he dropped at a nearby chair, and looked around the room, "what a pain."

Shiho also looked around, and then started walking around the large room, opening some drawers here and there, and checking the titles of some books. "What are you doing?" he couldn't help but ask.

"Looking for something valuable," she promptly answered. "The servants looked frightened, but if they knew what happened, they would have told the authorities, already, and would try to stop us from entering. They were most likely afraid of the person – or the people, who entered here before us and did this. What I am saying, basically, is that this is our only chance to take something valuable from this 'mission'".

Deidara raised an eyebrow at her coldness. He couldn't say he didn't approve. It wouldn't be so bad to get out of here with something worth his trouble.

"We can't check the entire house, but maybe we can get something from here… oh, it doesn't seem like there's anything good in here. Wait, what is this?"

Too curious to just stand around nonchalantly, Deidara approached her from behind. She was messing with one of the portraits on a wall. A secret compartment behind? Such a boring cliché. It seemed stuck and it looked like Shiho was going to use force to rip it off the wall, when she stopped. Was she too weak? He thought about pushing her away and doing the job himself, but she signaled for him to stop.

She performed a jutsu he never saw before. Unable to know what its effects were, he watched as she waited for a while and only then proceeded to rip the portrait off and let it fall to the floor.

"Look at the small seals in this hole's borders. They are meant to be activated when someone forces the portrait open. There must be a way to open it correctly, but we have no time to discover how to do so. At any rate, this is clearly a stored fire jutsu, that would hit this explosive tag here – she pointed at an explosive tag in the hole's roof – and that would most likely ignite a greater explosions… ah, you see?"

She pushed some wallpaper that hid many other explosive tags. While Deidara always thought the things quite pathetic, he had to admit that if they ran through the entire wall, anyone who ripped the portrait away would be dead meat.

"How did you know any of this?"

"There has been an explosion here, before. The wall has been repaired and the wallpaper, changed, but the borders of the stone are still a little singed. You can tell they look like the remains of a great explosion. I merely used an stasis technique. It is meant to stop a jutsu from working temporarily inside the stabilized radius I create. The seals were simple, in the end, so it was easy."

Now that she told him all of this, he had to feel a little disconcerted at not noticing the details of what was his area of expertise. He gave her a nod of acknowledgement, before turning back to the revealed hole. "Then, let's look what is inside. Got to be something good."

Upset at having her taking charge of things lately, he decided to pick the lone object inside, that was wrapped inside a dark cloth. Unwrapping it, the boy realized it was a lone bracer. It had kanji drawn on it, one for wind and one for fire, the wind one being smaller and closer to the wrist. It looked quite strong and was of a dark and nice looking material, but didn't look like something a person would hide behind locks and traps for safety.

Shiho adjusted her glasses, seeming as puzzled as he was. "Maybe it is to help enhancing the power of techniques from people with fire and wind nature transformations?"

Deidara was irritated. This had to be something more, right? Or maybe whatever there was of truly valuable inside this mini vault was already taken away, and the bracers were just put there at random?

"We better go now," the blond woman continued, suddenly looking like she was in a hurry. And maybe she was right. While he did much worse than kill a person, he didn't want to be found here and have people spreading rumors about how he killed his clients and stole from them.

Shiho went to a shelf and started eyeing some books. "You can keep the bracers, Deidara-san. They might prove to be useful."

"What are you taking, then?" he asked, and frowned when she smiled at him, while holding a heavy book.

"This book is an excellent source for decoders and cryptographers as myself!" she looked quite pleased indeed, "If I manage to develop my techniques through this, it will be enough reward for my trouble. Also, I cannot perform the manipulation of any nature transformation. Whatever this bracer, or bracelet, does, it is of no use for me."

"I don't manipulate wind or fire, either," Deidara said, but was already shoving the thing inside his backpack. Maybe he could sell it later, or something.

"Well, don't tell me your explosions don't deal with fire. And if it is useless, just throw it away." She looked solemn for a moment. "Although… I wouldn't recommend for you to do so. Well, it is not wise of us to stay here for much longer, so I'll be taking my leave. Goodbye, Deidara-san. We couldn't work together, but I wish you well."

Deidara grunted, not used to exchanging pleasantries, and not wanting to, but nodded to her nonetheless. "Same to you."

Shiho left through the same door they used to enter, but he knew she would most likely jump from some window. He watched her head of untidy hair disappear when she turned on a corner, and turned back to the room, wondering about what had happened. The killing was just so recent, maybe the assassin would still be nearby…

Still, this wasn't his problem. Taking one last look at his would-be client, he turned to the window. Some people were around down there in the street, but he didn't mind if they saw him. The mission was over before it started; he would fight if he had to. Specially after such an anticlimactic conclusion for this travel.

He prepared to jump.

A face looked up at him from the sidewalk.

Scratched Mist headband. Red clouds. His eyes narrowed.

"Not so fast, kiddo." The tall – and blue – man's mouth stretched into a smile, revealing sharp teeth. His whole appearance was disturbing, and Deidara would have attacked, had he not felt two presences that decided to reveal themselves, just behind him.

He tried to avoid giving his back to any of them. They were all in Akatsuki's cloaks, so this was an ambush… but why? Did they kill the Daimyo? Most likely. But why would they bother with him?

On the other hand, considering how much destruction he caused in this short time as a missing ninja, the chances he could have damaged something treasurable to the organization were not so insignificant as he would have liked.

He tried to judge the situation. One of the Akatsuki was tall, with unnaturally pale skin and very strange facial features. His eyes were snake like and disturbing to look at, and he had long, black hair that most likely trailed to his back. These looks… Orochimaru. Orochimaru of the Sannin, he could remember, because every academy student in any ninja village would learn about this man, so he did, also. It seemed like this would be no child's play.

The third Akatsuki member had quite a strange posture. He had a very hunched back, and Deidara had to wonder whether he could fight well. But what truly caught his attention was his face, if it could be called that. It was alarmingly… dead. And so were his eyes. Never before had he seen anyone who looked like that, unless they were a statue. For a moment, he had to wonder whether he was. Unbelievably enough, looking at this one bothered Deidara the most, even if the others weren't normal by any means.

He knew about them. A mercenary group supposed to be composed by the most powerful missing nin around. They would take many assignments for a price below what a lone nukenin would expect, and he would bet their objective was something much greater than the mere accumulation of money. He, himself, would never have the energy and disposition to work hard, if he hadn't his own dream.

Some of his sculptures had still been outside… they had to be good in order to be able to hide from them until now. Or they were already here, if it was true that they killed the Daimyo.

He saw the mist nukenin below jump to where he was, and appear right by his side. The blond was unwilling to even flinch. The closeness exposed the other's strange shark-like features. What was he, a lab rat?

The shark-man's smile had faded by now. "The chakra we felt all the way to here… it doesn't belong to this little guy. We should follow the other."

"That one was truly a woman," Orochimaru said confidently. "She was a ninja from Konohagakure. Used to work in the cryptography team. I didn't recognize her chakra, but I do remember her face from when I saw her once."

"Then she was the one we followed all the way until here. As she was with the brat the entire time, and he hid his own energy, we believed her chakra would be his," the hunched form said in a voice that was as disturbing as his whole body.

"It matters not. The point is that we found him."

"Care to tell me what you want?" Deidara asked impatiently. Even he was apprehensive enough about this situation to try and understand things before starting the combat.

"You just got a free membership to the greatest missing nin organization in the world, kid," the shark-man said, his humor having returned as soon as he was assured he was indeed his target. "Congratulations."

"So you want to ask me to join, mm? But why the hell would I? I've been doing fine by myself."

And even as he said that, he carefully called for each and every one of his creations outside, hoping there wouldn't be a fourth Akatsuki member to detect them. As any shinobi who had once been a member of the Explosion Corps would, he made sure to observe the many details of any building before entering in. Hoping to earn time, he started taking his bombs away from their watchful locations, ordering them to insert themselves into strategic places here and there, but specially in the foundation of the mansion.

"You say so, but you have been through some tough ordeals, haven't you? You're still new to this business," the tallest said, as if explaining something basic to a little kid. "You can't just fly around destroying the world and expect to stay alive for too long."

Deidara shrugged, feigning nonchalance. "A performer should be free to develop his art without any interferences or hesitation caused by such little concerns."

"…what are you talking about, brat?"

Deidara couldn't help himself. "I'm a freelancer artist, yeah," he said, puffing his chest in pride. "I travel through the world displaying my beautiful creations! My artwork never ceases to amaze people from the most varied countries!"

A long silence ensued.

The blue skinned man was the first to cut it, by clearing his throat uncomfortably. "Forgive me, Sasori-san, but I think we got the wrong one. Don't you?"

"Regrettably, he is the one we seek," this Sasori answered. "Come, boy. Surely even you, with all your idiosyncrasy and self-aggrandizing, know you have no chance."

He knew no such thing. He had heard these same words from the Tsuchikage, a man much more powerful than this trio, and still managed to prove him wrong… in his first art show, no less! This would be a piece of cake, if he just did things right.

Being silent had been a mistake, for it seemed that they lost their patience and decided to advance. Well, the blue man and Sasori did, blocking both exits. Orochimaru didn't seem like he wanted to bother. Well, he would care about him soon enough.

Wanting to test his opponents proficiency, he went for the smaller one, that strange thing that seemed to be the most scornful of the three. Would he lose to simple taijutsu?

An enormous mechanic tail sprouted from his back so fast he only had time to blink before it hit his midsection, throwing him in the nearby bookstand Shiho had been looking at minutes before. He fell to the floor but quickly got up, finding it hard to breathe. He cursed his slow reflexes. He should have used an explosion on it.

The tail moved like a serpent, quite flexible even in its metallic glory, and the tip shone with a purple liquid. Blue eyes widened.

"That is right, imp. Poison. I tried to avoid poisoning you, but if you cause too much trouble, I won't mind using it on you. I am talented enough to revive your dying body once we get to our base. If your organism survives all the way until there, of course."

The shark man, who closed the distance between them, rolled his eyes. "And of course his death would have been an accident- whoa! Calm down, kid."

"Katsu!"

The two birds the blond sent to clash against the stranger were quickly intercepted by an enormous… sword? A bandaged thing fixed to a hilt? Deidara expected the twin explosions to happen at his command but instead, the sculptures merely started to heat before touching the bandaged thing the man carried around, and then fell down to the floor, unmoving and without any chakra of his left.

His blood froze.

The repulsive technique that killed his creations… was that it? What happened? He tried desperately to understand. Was this freakish man related to the abhorrent ninja who destroyed his art with a katana?

But… no. This wasn't right. Back in Waves, he felt the energy of each of his statues being abruptly cut, as if cleanly severed. Here, he felt a drain, the chakra being sucked somewhere else, instead of being nullified.

Anxious and wanting to know more about these techniques that had been a worry in his mind for a long time, he threw himself at the man who, predictably, defended himself with his strange weapon. Hitting it with a kick as heavy as he could manage, Deidara called forth his kekkei genkai chakra that exploded from his leg, while his normal chakra cared for protecting his flesh. His skin felt uncomfortably hot, but he developed this ability well enough not to end messed up was he would back in Rock.

This time, it was worse.

Not only the explosion was sucked by the thing but, as soon as his leg made contact with it, he felt a good part of his chakra reserves being drained – both of them. He quickly jumped out of the man's reach, but he could feel that half of his energy was gone. He looked up, speechless. He heard about chakra drainers, but never such a potent one. His bloodline limit chakra was specially potent, how could so much of it be gone in a simple strike?

He expected the shark-man to look down at him smugly, but he was frowning, instead.

"Two kinds of chakra? That is new. And one tastes really strange," Deidara bristled at how the life force that made him an artist was being regarded as food. "Samehada doesn't like it at all…"

Samehada? Was it the thing's name, or the man's name, and he liked to talk about himself in third person? The chakra taken away from him… it wasn't spent, it was still there. And while he couldn't feel his normal one, gone as it was and out of his reach, he could, with some effort, feel a little of his own energy swirling inside of the shark-man's "sword". Rebelling against its prison. He had an idea… would it work?

He made his typical hand seal and concentrated, calling for the stolen chakra. "Katsu!"

And there was no explosion, but a disturbing noise filled the room. A sick and high pitched scream that Deidara had never heard before, coming from the enemy's weapon. It screeched and started shaking, ripping some of its wrapping open, and revealing shiny and sharp tiny blades… scales. They matched the horrible wounds in the Daimyo's corpse. This battle was leaving Deidara more stunned every time.

He could feel his chakra burning and finally being consumed as it tried to obey his will. Too suppressed by the thing that ate it and was clearly alive, the kekkei genkai created no explosion, but must have burned the creature's insides quite badly.

"You…" any playfulness disappeared from the Mist shinobi, and Deidara felt very apprehensive. The man looked more dangerous than ever, and even if Deidara wasn't very sensitive, he could feel his enormous chakra rising. Unnatural. But he was getting used to bizarreness.

"It seems I won't have to deal with the child as my partner, and won't be the one held responsible for his demise, either," Sasori remarked, sounding quite satisfied.

Orochimaru wasn't as pleased. "We haven't gone through such trouble just for you to kill the boy. Do keep your head on your shoulders, Kisame-san. And you, Deidara-kun, stop messing around. I assure you this will do no good for you."

No point on attacking the Mist one directly, Deidara thought, I don't want to be killed in a blink. They are all very strong, I have to admit that. Very much like the Tsuchikage was stronger than me.

Closing his eyes, he felt for his explosives, shiny dots in his field of vision, and all ready for this strategy. He didn't want to do this, truly, but he didn't have a choice. And if he could take a chance to flee, he would. It seemed like this was what he was doing the most recently, the Rock missing nin thought with disgust, but there was no way he was coming with Akatsuki.

With a mental command, he had many bombs leaving his pouches. They were small and simulated real life birds, insects and reptiles that were very fast. He would need that speed, now.

Spending each and every one of his premade constructions in a single move was too dangerous, but he needed to have his three adversaries occupied for long enough so that they wouldn't leave the building. The room swarmed with the explosives, that flew and crawled and jumped all over the place.

The blond started activating them one by one in quick succession, in such a way that it was quite hard to defend against them all. They weren't the most potent but could do quite some damage together, but he could see his enemies were getting rid of them fast. There wasn't much time. Deidara felt for the secret explosives around the mansion, quickly ran below the sturdy wood table of the Daimyo's, and screamed, "Katsu!"

All of them exploded in a planned sequence, concentrated as he was on bringing the place down. And that was exactly what happened. He felt the screams of confusion and tried to shield himself with the table even as the floor collapsed below them and the roof fell apart. In a matter of seconds, he was buried in a mess of concrete, mashed furniture and glass, darkness and pain, specially from his right foot, that he wasn't able to shield from the destruction.

There was too much rubble between him and the ground for him to escape with an earth technique, so he shoved the hand he could move inside his pouch and quickly molded and infused many small spiders, that he sent to run through the cracks and small openings. When they were far enough not to hit him directly he made them explode, pulverizing many sections of wreckage that held him down. Another round of those and he was able to push himself out. Because of his broken foot he had to sit down as soon as he was out in the open once again. He coughed dust and looked around.

One of his foes had been waiting for him.

His Akatsuki cloak was torn, and if any body parts were hurt, they were still hidden by it. Deidara couldn't help but smirk. He also hurt himself, but he had missed using his ability.

"It seems like you're the only one left, mm. I am preparing a nice one for you," he said, reaching for his pouch, glad he had so much clay ready. His explosive chakra could be halved, but it still was more than enough for what he had in mind. It was time to try out a new design of his.

"You almost got killed in your little stunt, and are still going to try it again?"

"Life is all about taking risks and getting rewards from it," he said contentedly, watching the last enemy standing.

"But that's the thing with taking risks. Occasionally, you lose. Allow me to teach you this valuable lesson."

And then his hands inside of his bags froze, as did his entire body. What was this? Some kind of genjutsu? He felt his arms being raised as if by his will, and no matter how much he resisted, his hands rose slowly, closing over his throat, and clenching.

Deidara gasped as his air supply was cut out. He could see the strange man's, Sasori's, hands moving, fingers directed at him, as if to control his movements. How could this be? He tried to comprehend his predicament, but his choking was sidetracking his mind.

So was seeing his other two enemies appearing from behind what was once the great mansion. Kisame had some bleeding wounds, but they didn't seem to bother him. Orochimaru, on the other hand, was perfectly intact, the only one who looked like he had just arrived, not even a little burn on his clothes.

"I am tired of this game," Kisame growled, his sword thing still whining pitifully. "Fancy you would be the one to come with a Shadow Clone only."

"I wouldn't approach our little terrorist with my own body. Of course I could protect myself, but let's be serious, distance from explosions is common sense."

"Kisame, you know what to do," Sasori said as Deidara's vision started filling with black dots.

"There is no way I am having Samehada absorb any more of his… dirt! It is poison!"

"If you take all of his chakra… or chakras and leave only a very small amount, I doubt he will be capable of manipulating what has been absorbed anymore. Make him reach the state where the body only concentrates on staying alive."

Kisame seemed cynical, and looked angrily at the boy who was standing on a broken foot and choking himself, still managing to glare daggers at them all. "Little bastard," he growled, circling him, and running Samehada over him, not thoroughly, but enough to shred the outer layers of skin from his it hurt a lot, but nothing was like the feeling of all of his energy going out, without warning… as if he had spent an entire day fighting, and not less than half an hour. All of his chakra was gone but a very small amount that he needed to survive. Never before had he felt so dead.

Sasori clearly stopped bothering to exert control of his body. His hands fell from his neck and his body fell slack to the ground, raising a small cloud of dust. His exhaustion wouldn't allow him to move, and he was thrown over someone's shoulder like a potato sack.

"There you have it. Our mission is complete," a voice said, one he was too tired to identify.

"Not that you were a great help."

"Forgive me for expecting that you two would be able to deal with a what? Fourteen years old? Fifteen? Without such a commotion."

"Let's just take him to the Leader. I think we need to perform some first aid, though. He is bleeding profusely."

"Kisame-san, I told you to control yourself."