One of Those Days (Part 4)

[Rockinmuffin]

After ten minutes of mumbled obscenities and shouts of death-threats to no one in particular, you finally discovered that someone had decided to play a little trick on you. You growled as you released the jutsu that had been cast, dispelling the illusion that had caused you to wander aimlessly around a single hall and make you look like an idiot. It wasn’t too hard, considering it was a low-level genjutsu technique; genin level at best. You were more upset by the fact that you fell for it so easily.

You weren’t sure who decided to prank you, but your gut was telling you it would be most satisfying to pummel Deidara to near-death. You whole-heartedly agreed.

Your stomach grumbled its protest. “All right; eat first, then use the blonde idiot as a punching-bag.” And with that said and done, you skipped off to the kitchen to provide your tummy with sustenance.

You were surprised to find Hidan wearing a frilly, pink Kiss the Cook apron as he watched over his cookies that were currently baking in the oven. Kakuzu was sitting at the table reading the newspaper, grumbling something about taxes rising or whatnot. As if he even paid his taxes. Cheap bastard.

You entered the kitchen completely, not surprised at all when both Akatsuki members ignored your presence. They weren’t on as friendly terms with you as the others were and tended to avoid you like the plague on most occasions.

It was for the better. You never forgave Hidan for trying to sacrifice you to his evil god while you were sleeping, nor did you forgive Kakuzu for the time he tried to sell you to a pimp in one of the neighboring villages for only two-thousand ryo. You had argued that you worth at least three-thousand ryo. The pimp had tried to haggle the price down to two-hundred ryo, but Kakuzu soon became frustrated and stabbed the man in the chest with a fork and stole his wallet while Hidan dragged away the body.

In the end it all worked out; Kakuzu got his money, Hidan got his sacrifice, and you got to keep your life and not live out the rest of your years as a cheap prostitute. It was an everybody wins situation. Well, except for the pimp, but that’s okay because he thought you were cheap so his death was justified.

Ahem, moving on…

You walked quietly towards Hidan, leaning over his shoulder to watch the cookies rise within the oven. In fact, you were so engrossed in your cookie-watching that you failed to notice as Hidan turned towards you with an angry stare.

“Must you get so close?” Hidan questioned with grit teeth, his eyes glaring daggers into your skull.

You ignored his question in favor of asking one of your own. “Can I have a cookie?”

Hidan gave you a blank look. “No.” You opened your mouth to protest but he quickly interrupted you before you had a chance. “These cookies are bait for luring unsuspecting fools into my trap so that I can capture them and use them as sacrifices. Besides, you keep a bag of cookies in your cloak.”

“Yeah, but those cookies are fresh!” you answered with an exaggerated pout. “And don’t forget, I gave you a cookie earlier today; you owe me!”

“You got crumbs in my eye, you cookie-mongering whore!”

You just looked up at Hidan with large, tear-filled, puppy-dog eyes.

Hidan sighed. “You do realize the puppy-dog pout doesn’t work on me, right? I drown puppies. For fun.” You just kept looking at him with that same expression. “…If I give you a cookie, will you leave me alone and go bother Kakuzu?”

You slowly nodded your head.

Hidan reluctantly grabbed a cookie from within the oven. Unfortunately, the baked good was still in the process of baking so it was extremely hot. Hidan flinched, but gained a sinister grin as his tiny pea brain devised a vile scheme. He turned towards you, that plotting smirk of his still on his face, and threw the burning-hot, half-baked cookie towards your face.

Luckily for you, hanging out with Deidara had taught you to always be prepared for something painful or dangerous (or better yet, a combination of the two) to suddenly blow up in your face. You skillfully ducked your head just in time, avoiding Hidan’s attack.

Instead, the burning chocolaty-chipped projectile hit another target.

And no, it wasn’t Deidara. Sadly.

Kakuzu yelped in pain as he was hit on the bridge of his nose. You and Hidan could do nothing but watch as Kakuzu rolled on the floor in pain, holding his nose as he grumbled such vulgar curses that it would make a sailor blush. He finally recovered and picked himself off the floor, his eyes glaring daggers in your and Hidan’s head.

“Which one of you did it?” he questioned, his voice deadly serious.

You didn’t even think twice as you immediately pointed your index finger towards Hidan.

Kakuzu glared at Hidan, causing the pale-haired man to gulp. A dangerous glint flashed in Kakuzu’s eyes as he pulled out a box of very sharp-looking butcher knives from the depths of his cloak. You gulped and quickly exited the kitchen, speeding up your pace when you heard the pain-filled screams of Hidan.

Normally you’d feel guilty, but you’d already beaten up your conscious earlier that morning so you wouldn’t have to worry about that pesky voice for the rest of the day. Besides, it was either you or Hidan, and considering he was the one that had thrown the cookie in the first place, he was getting his just desserts.

Anyways, the worst that Kakuzu could do was decapitate him, but it’s not like it would be the first time.

It was a good thing that Hidan was immortal, otherwise he would’ve been dead a long, long time ago.

On second thought, maybe that was a bad thing… Oh well.

You pushed the thought out of your mind, cheerfully skipping through the halls while humming a tune that faintly resembled The Ding-Dong Song (which, by the way, is a fun song, so check it out).

“Oh, you touch my tralala!” you sang out of tune as you headed back towards the living room. “Mmm! My ding-ding-dong!” You jumped on the couch, ignoring the grunt of pain that came from Orochimaru as you landed on his stomach. However, due to the snake-nin’s lumpy, bony body, you scooted over to the other side of the couch.

Orochimaru didn’t know whether to rejoice or groan in disappointment.

…And if you don’t get the joke, then you and your mind should take a trip to the gutters. They’re actually quite lovely at this time of year.

“_____-senpai, did you enjoy your adventure?” Tobi questioned as he tilted his head to the side in a cute manner.

“Not so great” you answered as you stretched out your legs, using Orochimaru’s stomach as a leg rest. “First, Sasori-san came to harass me and told me that Itachi-san was looking for me, which is already enough to put me in a foul mood. Then some jerk decided to cast genjutsu on me so I ended up walking down the same hallway over forty three times. Then, when I went to go to the kitchen to get something to eat, Hidan tries to hit me in the face with a half-baked cookie and scar my beautiful face. Which reminds me, I’m still hungry! So, no Tobi-kun, I didn’t enjoy my adventure.” You folded you arms across your chest, brooding even more than Sasuke when Itachi stole his favorite brand of mascara.

Tobi tried to back away from you discreetly, but you instantly turned your glare towards him. He immediately stopped in his tracks, for fear of facing your wrath. Deidara had warned him of your fury, telling the masked boy of your violent outbursts around a campfire when it was his turn to tell a scary story. Tobi could still recall a story in which Deidara had stolen a chocolate bar from you and you responded by shoving said chocolate bar up where the sun don’t shine. Deidara had claimed that he walked with a limp for weeks.

“Do you think you could move your feet…?” Orochimaru requested quietly, being careful as to not upset you. You glared at the snake-nin, lifting your feet, then slamming them back against Orochimaru’s stomach full-force. He let out a small “Oof” of pain as precious oxygen was forced out of his lungs.

He didn’t ask you to move your feet again.

You grumbled to yourself as you pulled out a cookie from your cloak and munched quietly on it.

Why didn’t you do that in the first place? Because that would’ve been too easy. If you had grabbed a cookie from your cloak in the first place then you wouldn’t have visited Hidan and Kakuzu and this story would have even less of a plot than it currently has, which is scarce to none.

You looked over your surroundings as you slowly nibbled your cookie. Everything was as you had left it; Orochimaru in pain on the couch, Kabuto drooling on the floor, Zetsu in a trance under the heating lamp, Tobi standing around like an idiot, and Deidara… Wait, where did the blonde wonder go?

“Hey, Tobi-kun, where’d Deidara-san wander off to?” you asked with a quirked eyebrow.

Tobi directed his vision down to his hands, twiddling his thumbs nervously as he answered you. “Um, Tobi cannot tell you…”

You frowned. “Oh? And why not?”

Tobi glanced up at you timidly from behind his mask. “Because Deidara-senpai told Tobi not to tell you.”

“Why?” you urged Tobi to answer. You were starting to grow suspicious. If Deidara didn’t want you to find him then that probably meant that he did something to earn himself a beating.

“Because you’ll beat up Deidara for using genjutsu on you in the hallway.”

Your right eye twitched lightly as you stared at Tobi, unblinking. Your intense gaze caused the boy to gulp behind his mask. “Tobi-kun…” you drawled slowly, your eye still twitching, “Are you telling me that Deidara was the one that used genjutsu on me earlier?”

Tobi slowly nodded his head.

“…That demented freak is dead.” Your face darkened as you calmly stood to your feet, heading towards the hallway that led to Deidara’s room. You stopped when you reached the entryway to the living room, turning your head towards Tobi so abruptly that your neck made a sickening cracking sound. Your eerily calm gaze rested on Tobi’s figure. “…Come.”

The simple command was all it took to get Tobi scurrying behind you like a frightened puppy.

You made a note to yourself to lay down some newspapers soon incase Tobi got overexcited and had a little accident all over the carpet. …Because you knew Leader would make you pay for that. Or at least try to make you clean it up.

In no time you found yourself standing before the entrance to Deidara’s room. On any other occasion you would’ve knocked on the door and politely waited for him to answer it before punching him in the nose, however, you weren’t feeling all too generous at the moment.

“Holy crap, yeah!” Deidara shouted as you broke down his door, using Tobi’s body and thick skull as a battering ram.

“Tobi was useful! Tobi’s a good boy!”

“I really hate that kid, yeah” Deidara muttered to himself.

Deidara didn’t have much time to complain about Tobi, because you still had unfinished business with the moron that had decided to get on your bad side. Deidara’s face paled as he caught sight of you cracking your knuckles while glaring at him dangerously.

“So, _____-san, what brings you here, yeah?” Deidara asked nervously with a smile.

“So,” you drawled venomously, “You enjoy playing tricks on poor, defenseless little girls, so you?”

“Well, yeah, but that’s beside the point! You’re a part of Akatsuki; you’re far from defenseless, let alone little, yeah.”

You growled viciously. “…Did you just call me fat?”

“…Oh crap, yeah.”

It was a good thing that you didn’t know how to work Deidara’s exploding clay jutsu because you had stuck his clay up where the sun don’t shine and it could cause internal bleeding. The blonde was also thankful for this, seeing as the entirety of the Akatsuki’s medical skills were lacking; the first time Deidara had lost one of his arms (yes, Deidara has made a habit of losing his limbs) Leader had tried to reattach the arm with nothing but a roll of duct tape. When that failed, Leader just gave the poor boy a Hello Kitty Band-Aid and sent him on his way.

“That was fun” you declared in an overly-cheery voice as you discreetly wiped away Deidara’s blood from your hands on Tobi’s pants. Deidara moaned in pain while Tobi frowned at the blood stain on his pants. “This calls for a celebration! Tobi, you’re going to take me out to the nicest restaurant your money can buy!”

Tobi blinked at you from behind his mask. “Why?”

“Because I said so.” You grabbed hold of Tobi’s arm, tugging him out of Deidara’s room. “…And I own your soul” you added as an afterthought.

As you and Tobi skipped off to go on your date, Deidara limped away in search for some Band-Aids.

~~~~~~*~~~~~~

You pouted with your arms crossed in front of your chest as you sat alone at your table. Tobi would be sitting with you if it wasn’t for the fact that he was too busy trying to get an autograph from some man dressed in an over-sized rat costume.

It seems that with Tobi’s small salary (which was even smaller than yours, considering he wasn’t even in the Akatsuki) wasn’t enough to take you out to one of the nice restaurants that you would’ve preferred to go to. No, instead, the best that Tobi’s money could buy was a romantic evening at Chuck E. Cheese’s.

How lovely.

The scent of burnt pizza filled your nostrils as the joyful shouts if children filled your ears as they terrorized everyone in the building; children ran free around the halls, played violent video games, and formed a violent mob around Chuck E. Cheese as they pulled at his limbs and dragged him away into the deepest, darkest pits of the inside jungle gym.

This only further supported your theory that small children would be best kept in cages.

Tobi crawled back to the table with his shoulders slumped, a disappointed frown behind his mask. “Tobi didn’t get Chuck’s autograph” he whined with a sniffle.

You glared at him in response.

“But Tobi got tokens! Tobi stole them from a little girl with pigtails!” Tobi presented you with a handful of shiny, and in your opinion, worthless coins engraved with the image of the giant vermin that you despised and small children idolized. “Can Tobi be in the Akatsuki now?”

You sighed to yourself as you massaged your temples. “…Just go play some arcade games or something.” When Tobi was out of sight you allowed your head to fall painfully against the tabletop with a loud thump.

“Hey there little girl! Turn that frown upside-down” came an overly-annoying voice. You slowly picked up your head to see another man dressed in one of those hideous rodent costumes. “I bet you’ll feel better if you give me a hug!” The man in the Chuck E. costume extended his arms out to you.

Two minutes later and the man in the costume was lying in the rubbish bin unconscious and you had returned to your table with an almost-content sigh slipping past your lips.

“Hey, Lady?” You stared down at the little urchin that dared to speak to you. “What’cha doing?”

You glared. “Imagining several scenarios in which you die slowly and painfully by my hands.”

“Why?”

“Because your mere presence irritates me.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re a sickening, disgusting individual.”

“Why?”

“Because you touch yourself at night.”

“…” The boy was silent for a moment, but it didn’t last long. “Why?”

You sighed irritably. “Because you walked in on your parents having sex at a young age. Now go away before I throw a cookie at your eye.”

“…One time I ate a nickel.”

“So you’re an even bigger idiot than I thought?” you asked sarcastically with a raised eyebrow. “Good for you.”

“I haven’t changed my underwear in three days.”

You twitched lightly. “Look Kid, I could care less about your personal hygiene or lack thereof. Just get away from me.”

“My mom went home without me ten minutes ago. She does that a lot.”

The rest of the night continued on this way with the boy (Let’s call him Terrance) telling you things of little importance, you banging your head against the tabletop repeatedly, and Tobi playing ski-ball.

~~~~~~*~~~~~~

“So, how’d your dinner date go, yeah?” Deidara, now fully-bandaged though still suffering from a slight limp, asked you.

You turned towards Deidara slowly. “Kill me.”

“Oh, it couldn’t have been that bad, yeah!” Deidara stated with a wave of his hand.

“Look at what Tobi won!” Tobi held up a fake mustache which had cost him all forty-seven of his tickets. Tobi excitedly placed the mustache on his mask. “Tobi’s a good boy!”

Deidara gave you no sympathy. “None of this would’ve happened if you picked me to be your fake boyfriend, yeah.”

You crossed your arms over your chest, pouting. “Next time I’ll just pay Kakuzu-san to do it” you muttered bitterly to yourself. “At least I wouldn’t have to worry about him taking me to a children’s restaurant; the jerk-face is too cheap even for that.”

“Damn straight!” Kakuzu explained from his seat, counting the money in his wallet to make sure that Hidan didn’t steal any of his cash in order to lure more potential sacrifices. Little did he know, Hidan had done just that but had replaced the stolen money with Monopoly money. Kakuzu growled as he came across several multicolored bills then stalked off to go teach Hidan a lesson, butcher knife in hand.

You couldn’t suppress the yawn that escaped from behind your lips; the day had been long and exhausting and was starting to catch up to you. “Sleepy, sleepy” you muttered incoherently to yourself as you closed your eyes and used Tobi’s chest as a pillow. Deidara’s single visible eye glared at the masked buffoon while Tobi resisted the urge to put the fake mustache on you while your guard was down.

Knowing that if he attacked Tobi then you would just smack him for disturbing your pillow, Deidara let out a sigh and slowly approached you. “Come on, _____-san,” he called softly as he nudged your shoulder, “Time for bed, yeah.”

“Noooo…” you whined as you nuzzled against Tobi, drooling lightly on his shirt. “I don’t wanna sleep with you, Dei-chan. I’m tired and I’ll never get any sleep in your bed!”

“As much as I would love to have you in my own bed, yeah, you need to go back to your own room to sleep. Tobi and I won’t be here to protect you forever and Kabuto’s been giving you weird looks since you got back from your date, yeah.”

You opened an eye, confirming Deidara’s statement when you saw Kabuto sitting in a beanbag chair across from you, staring at you drooling as he mumbled several inappropriate things involving bacon. You blinked stupidly, then shuddered, then foamed a little from your mouth, then drooled on Tobi’s shirt, then shuddered some more.

“…Are you quite finished, yeah?”

“Just a second…” Your right eye twitched a few times. “Now I’m done.”

Deidara sighed as he reached for your hand. “Sometimes I worry about you, yeah” he stated as he pulled you off the couch, the mouth on his hand nibbling your wrist gently. You responded with an obviously fake smile and a swift kick to his groin. He fell to the ground on his knees, his hands clutching his crotch as he stared up at you with wide eyes. “Bitch, yeah!” he screeched in an unusually high-pitched voice.

“I love you too!” you called out as you left the living room and headed towards your bedroom. You snickered to yourself as you skipped down the hallways; a warm, cozy feeling had rested itself in your chest cavity, though you weren’t sure whether it was happiness or nausea. Probably a little bit of both.

You were in such high spirits that you even waved to Sasori as you passed him, just as he was about to enter his room.

“Good night, Sasori-san! Sleep tight! Don’t let the bed bugs bite!” you squealed as you skipped past him, out of his range of vision within seconds.

“Sasori slowly waved back, despite the fact that you couldn’t see it. “What an odd girl” he murmured to himself as he entered his own bedroom. He closed his door quietly behind himself with a small smile.

Strangely, Sasori was also in an uncharacteristically good mood. It must’ve been a result of the coffee… Or the mental images of Deidara covered in chocolate. Whatever.

With these thoughts in mind, Sasori pulled back his bed covers to prepare himself for a busy night alone, only to find a swarm of termites taking over his bed and munching on his headboard.

His screams were heard by everyone within a thirty mile radius.

You smiled as you tucked yourself in bed, enjoying Sasori’s screams of pain as the termites ate his arms and legs. Ah, yes. Revenge is sweet.

You closed your eyes and laid your head on the pillow, preparing yourself for a good night of sleep. You even made sure to shut the window by your bedside to prevent you from falling on the rose bushes again. You grinned as you snuggled against your pillow, pulling your toasty Captain Planet blanket up until it reached your chin and hugging your one-eyed, armless teddy bear (whom you affectionately named Deidara Junior) against your chest.

Yup. It was a perfect night and nothing could possibly ruin it.

You frowned to yourself as you felt something heavy shift on your bed. Thinking that it was Deidara (or possibly Kabuto), you opened your eyes with a glare.

…Only to be met with a pair of Sharnigan orbs.

“Seventy-two hours of torture start now” he stated with a saucy wink as you were pulled into a world of red, black, white.

Three days later you woke up feeling tired, sore, and strangely satisfied.

THE END!