"Kakashi-senpai!"
He lazily glanced at his pink-cheeked kohai without halting in his push-ups. A safe fifteen feet away, Gai was enthusiastically doing his own workout, counting at the top of his lungs while his creepy bug-eyed devotee shouted encouragement and danced around.
Unusual. Tenzou usually had the sense not to wander too close to Gai. Not after the unfortunate incident when Gai had corralled him into whatever challenge had been going on at the time. Something involving counting grains of rice, if his perfect memory served him correctly.
Tenzou nervously glanced between his two superiors, before seeming to clench his jaw. "Senpai, Hokage-sama came back today."
"Thank you, messenger pidgeon," he allowed graciously, raising a sardonic eyebrow before turning his face back down to the ground, concentrating on his repetitions. He had let Gai win tic-tac-toe last time, so he had to win this challenge or face insufferable gloating about being two points ahead in their never-ending game.
Gai gave an enthusiastic roar from his belly, clapping his hands between reps and pounding his palms into the ground when he landed with enough force to send little cracks spidering through the dry earth. His kohai seemed more uneasy than the commonplace sight merited.
"Aiko didn't come back with her."
By the time the grin had faded from Gai's face in a sort of wary realization that now was not the time to taunt his rival about imminent defeat, Kakashi was already bounding through the upper branches in a path that cut rudely through two more training grounds on the way to the central administration building.
Tenzou caught up to him a few seconds later, clearly having been blind-sided by his sudden motion. "Don't- I mean, I don't really know that anything is wrong," he huffed, giving Kakashi a wide-eyed glance that perhaps hinted his expression was less than pleasant. "I just heard from Kotetsu when he got off his shift." He swallowed dryly, falling a half-step behind his commander. "Maybe she stayed late for some reason, or went to Suna with their ambassador. She spends a fair bit of time there."
The awkward reassurances didn't make him feel any better. The look on Tsunade's face when she saw him pick open the lock on her office window and step in made him feel considerably worse.
"It's like you have this seventh sense for when your underlings are in trouble," she remarked tiredly, dropping her gaze to her hands. "I was about to send for you."
The sound of Tenzou's sandals scuffling behind him was the first thing he noticed that indicated the boy had actually followed him in. Kakashi was holding his breath, tempted between pushing the Hokage for an explanation and not wanting to hear what she had to say.
"Akatsuki," she said finally, giving him a pitying look, wrinkles phasing through her genjutsu into visibility. "They sent at least one agent into the conference, supposedly from Ame. Aiko was… Aiko interfered when this woman assaulted Sabaku no Temari, and is currently missing in action. Along with the two jinchuuriki who were in the area." Her listless tone somehow made the news worse.
His jaw was locked shut.
"Missing in action?" Tenzou repeated quietly. His face was pale, but Kakashi didn't see. He was still staring at the wall behind Tsunade's head, struck stone still by horror.
"I'm sorry." Tsunade leaned over and painstakingly removed a worn envelope from her knapsack, which Yamato only now realized was still sitting on the floor by her desk. "Here." She stood to press it into Kakashi's hands, and seemed to waver on the thought of hugging him for comfort. He took it absently without looking at what he had.
She looked away and sat back down without offering any comfort. Probably for the best. He wouldn't know how to react to it. "For what it's worth, I don't think that they would necessarily want her dead. She's valuable. Akatsuki might want to barter her for Naruto. Of course, we can't…" Tsunade swallowed hard and averted her eyes, before quietly adding, "and she's a tricky little thing. Maybe she can get away."
"If she could, she would have," Kakashi muttered brokenly, hands limp at his sides. "but she's not dead."
The Hokage seemed surprised by his optimism, but nodded. "We have to hope so. I won't declare her dead until I abso-"
"No, I mean that she literally can't be dead," he interrupted testily, giving the floor a resentful glare. "See?"
Yamato and Tsunade exchanged a look that implied he'd lost his damn mind.
"Senpai, that's a kunai," the younger man ventured cautiously when Kakashi gave it an impatient shake with the hand that wasn't absently clutching the sealed envelope.
"The sealing formula is still on it," he bit out sullenly, slipping the weapon away. "Hiraishin is sustained through constant connection with the creator. It would have failed if she were dead." After Minato had died, he had thought it was merely a nightmare for months and would only accept the truth when he felt the now ordinary kunai that he'd carried since he was twelve. He would never forget how it felt to hold a dead, empty piece of metal that had once been a source of comfort and strength.
The other two looked relieved for a second, before Tsunade had a thought that made her queasy.
"Does that mean my desk is going to explode one day?" She prodded it experimentally with a forefinger.
He didn't have time to answer before Tenzou interrupted with a suspiciously high-pitched, "Aiko-chan gave me an explosive without telling me about it?"
"Probably," Kakashi admitted honestly. "That sounds like something she would do. But no, they won't go off accidentally. The explosion is an intentional addition to the formula that she can activate at will. She wouldn't be so reckless as to give a half-dozen people seals that would explode if she died. Aiko isn't that irresponsible or short-sighted." He gave a slow exhalation, closing his visible eye and letting his head sag.
"But that's great news," Tenzou tried placatingly, giving him a faint smile. "We know she's okay."
"Of course she's not okay," he scoffed, gritting his teeth painfully for a moment before he continued. "If she were, she would just return."
"She could be lingering in order to try to assist the other hostages," Tsunade mused, looking as though his hypothesis was the best news she'd had all week. "Aiko would know that Iwa and Kumo are looking right at us. If she came back without them…" She grimaced. "That reminds me. I have a mission for you two of the highest level of sensitivity. The Raikage had already sent his proposed meeting time for exchanging the prisoner when I got back, and I don't want to exacerbate things by being late. The jackass scheduled it with such short notice that I will need you two to leave within an hour or so to make it on time. He probably didn't want us setting up an ambush," she mused sourly.
"Noted," Yamato mumbled, rubbing at the back of his neck. "But, about Aiko… What are you going to tell everyone else?"
Tsunade gave Yamato a helpless shrug, overlooking the man sulking between them. "The truth. What else can I say? I considered keeping this from Naruto when I realized just how hard it was going to be to keep him from doing exactly what Akatsuki wants, but it would be too cruel. Besides, I can't keep this quiet. Especially if it really is going to lead to war." She cringed, curling into herself and wrapping her arms around her chest, rubbing her sides as if she felt a chill.
"When exactly did this happen?"
At the sharp tone, Tsunade jerked to attention and directed all her attention to Kakashi, who suddenly looked intense and dangerous instead of like he was about to crumple over. "Ah—in the early hours three days ago," she clipped out, concentrating to remember more detailed information. "I last saw her at perhaps three in the morning."
"That's a long time for her to be incapacitated," Yamato noted uneasily. The worry on his face wasn't hard to decipher. She couldn't possibly sleep that long—they must have either poisoned her or all-but killed her to keep her immobilized for days on end.
He didn't even want to think about what awful things she might be enduring.
~~~
A day prior
"And then Kakuzu-sempai said that Hidan-san was a nuisance, so Tobi thought that Hidan-san might be sad and Tobi went to ask him if he needed to talk about his feelings, because that always helps Tobi!" There was a mournful silence, and then Madara Uchiha added with a quiver in his artificially high voice, "Hidan-san was embarrassed and he told Tobi that he didn't need to talk about his feelings. He didn't even want a hug! Wasn't that silly of him, Aiko-chan?" As he talked, he flung open a door and trotted in, leaving her to trail behind. He was very unlike the uber professional Itachi, she noted.
Before meeting this man in person, Aiko hadn't been certain if he was Obito driven mad by pain and grief, if he was Obito possessed by Madara but still somewhat present, or if Madara was merely wearing Obito's body like a fashionable coat. Now, she couldn't be anything but certain that there was nothing of Obito here, because no one who was anything less than pure, unadulterated evil could come up with a deception and persona as offensively irritating as this one. This act had been the product of decades of learning how to be an irritating jackass. Obito simply wouldn't have had the time to become this deranged.
"It was terribly silly," Aiko agreed solemnly, giving him a shy smile. "I bet he was just too bashful to accept it."
Evil lunatic or not, she valued her skin. Oddly enough, she might be safer with Madara than Itachi or Kisame. Itachi had reasons to kill her to protect Konoha, and Kisame or another Akatsuki might kill her if they thought it worth Pein's anger. Sure, she didn't have the thin protection of Pein's desire to keep her alive in regards to Madara, being as he was the real boss here. But he was also a person who planned, like, twenty years ahead. Sure, his plans were stupid, (form criminal organization, fuck around with Konoha, and then somehow rule the world?) but that was beside the point. The only reasons he would kill her would be if she was in the way of his plan (which she couldn't help) or if she ticked him off to the point where he didn't care about interfering with the efficiency of his puppet organization doing what he wanted it to do.
So instead of taunting him, she was pretending to be charmed by Tobi, since option # 1 (otherwise known as 'run away screaming bloody murder') was difficult when in a towel and half-dead from hunger and chakra exhaustion.
"Would you like a hug?" He leaned in far too close, as if trying to put her off balance or trick her into displaying unease. But Aiko was a goddamn champion of hiding distress behind a cutesy girl act, and she didn't so much as flinch. "You seem sad," Madara finished gravely.
' Sure, you crazy bastard.'
"I am a little sad," she admitted, gently shutting the drawer of no longer needed clothes that Deidara had left behind, clutching a black shirt with mesh shoulders to her chest. "I think you're right, I could use a hug."
He squealed and threw his arms around her shoulders—then just as easily flinched away dramatically and backed up all the way to the other wall. "Eek! Aiko-chan, you haven't put on clothes yet!" he wailed.
' No shit, Sherlock.'
"J-just turn around!" She squeaked out. It was lucky that he did, because she was unable to fake a blush. It was somewhat of a relief to drop her towel and pull the shirt over her head, even though it felt really fucking weird to wear a dead man's clothing and the mesh fell in a way that Anko would have approved of. Beggars couldn't be choosers. Deidara had been on the petite side for a man, but she was petite for a woman, so the shirt's hem was just barely long enough to be decent if she stayed perfectly still and there was no breeze.
That didn't seem like a likely combination of circumstances, so she pulled open the next drawer in hopes of finding pants, without noticing that the Uchiha turned around at the noise. It was just full of hair products, so she knelt to open the bottom one. That was successful. Aiko pulled them on post-haste, not caring that they were the worst fitting thing she'd ever worn. She could adjust the fit and make do. "I'm decent, Tobi-san," she called out, before turning around herself.
She had to blink at just how close he was. Aiko hadn't heard him move at all. To cover her surprise, she bit her lip before asking, "Is there a belt around or anything?" To demonstrate, she lifted her arms straight up so he could see how ill-fitting the slacks were.
"Ahh, you're so cuuuute, Aiko-chan," he squealed, lurching forward to pick her up around the waist and shake her around. She put a steadying hand on his shoulder and tried not to vomit.
"Tobi-san, I don't feel well," she choked out, meaning it.
Apparently he didn't want bile down his back, because he immediately stopped and put her on the ground gently. "Tobi doesn't think that any belts here would fit you." She had the odd sense that his lower lip was wobbling when he tilted his head down. It almost immediately popped back up, though, and he bounded off to the closet. "But Tobi is certain that he could make a new hole to make a belt smaller!"
'You're a genius alright,' she thought cynically. 'I have now known you for almost five minutes, and I know that I do not want you to be anywhere near me.'
"I would like that." Politely, she did not move towards the closet. Shinobi tended to get crabby when someone moved to box them into a confined space. The garment he emerged with was a very thin black belt. He painstakingly gouged out another hole with the tip of a kunai and then handed it over with a triumphant flourish.
' I might be safer with him, but this is nerve-wracking. Maybe I just should have stayed put in the first place.'
~~~
Itachi briefly pushed down the urge to give up on his elective situational pacifism when he came back after having begged a change of clothes off of Konan to find that his charge had apparently wandered off in the three minutes he had been absent.
'This child is an idiot of impressive proportions,' he noted tiredly, following the little wet footprints down the hall. They led to the kitchen—but faded before they led him back to the girl who'd left them. He didn't need them, however. A girlish voice was barely audible through the closed door to what had been Deidara's room once upon a time. Unease flickered in his consciousness. Either she was talking to herself, or she had run into someone else in the base.
He couldn't think of a single person in his area who could be trusted to behave around a captive from Konoha. Especially one who had potentially damaging information.
Perhaps he should have killed her when they had been alone earlier to prevent her knowledge from falling into Akatsuki's hands. He was loathe to end her without an immediate sense of danger, however. If all was truly well in the world, Itachi would never have to harm another sentient being in his life.
With a small amount of expertly hidden trepidation, he pushed the door open.
Immediately, he wished he hadn't. His patient was wearing some of Deidara's old clothes and sitting cross-legged on the duvet next to the man who called himself Tobi. They both looked up at him, but he had no illusions that the expression hidden behind that mask was the innocent curiosity on the girl's face. Madara was almost certainly getting no small amount of enjoyment out of this play-act. Had he accompanied the girl to thwart Itachi? As a silent threat? Or just because he got some strange amusement out of letting her think him a fool?
"You're just in time, Itachi-senpai!" his elder chirped in a tone that sounded demented to his ears. The placid enjoyment on the girl's face implied that it was his additional knowledge that gave him that sense. Then again, the amount of uncharacteristic trust and positivity on her expression was downright suspicious. Surely she wasn't so stupid as to genuinely be charmed by someone met in a den of S class criminals? Perhaps it was an attempt to ingratiate herself with someone who might help her escape—Tobi did portray himself as the most approachable.
' Then again, it is possible that she has recognized Tobi as someone to be wary of and does not wish to risk angering him.'
It seemed implausible from the manner in which she had provoked Pein that she would choose to kowtow to Tobi unless she seriously believed she was in imminent danger from him.
If that was the case, she had excellent instincts or her frightening visions of possible futures had let her on to Madara's secret identity.
The teenager tilted her head and smiled at him. "We're playing Go-Fish!"
Yes, that was downright uncannily out of character. The girl was acting. At least she was good at it: she seemed genuinely pleased to find herself playing child's games with a madman.
"I am afraid that I must borrow your companion." He let his expression linger deliberately on the prisoner. "Pein-sama has requested that I provide her with medical attention."
"Awww, Itachi-san! Can we play more later?"
Message received. Madara did indeed suspect he would try to keep the Uzumaki girl away from him, and he couldn't disobey now.
"Of course," he agreed tonelessly. There was no other option. "I prepared the medical supplies in the room where you were awoken. Come."
"No need for that!" Madara interrupted in that vexingly high pitched tone he favored, swiveling his orange mask to stare directly at his female companion. "Deidara-senpai kept some in here! I can get them for you." The quickly retrieved kit was rather disproportionally stocked with burn treatments, but it did have the antiseptic and bandages that would suit his purposes.
He kept the displeasure this solution aroused off his face. "Very well," Itachi agreed as if he did not care one way or the other. "However, it was unwise for you to dress her before her wounds had been treated. Deidara's shirt will have to be removed." At the reflexive grimace that provoked, he found the opportunity to add, "Perhaps it would be less intimidating for your companion if you were to give her as much privacy as possible."
"Whatever you say, Itachi-senpai!" Tobi bounced off the bed and out the door, a hint of menace in his almost manic movements that came just an iota too close to Itachi himself.
"I would suggest wrapping the towel around your torso to give me access to your wounds," he directed, strangely less comfortable now that he was alone with the otherworldly girl who knew far too much. Especially since he had just essentially ordered her to take her clothes off. He might have offered to wait in the hall while she changed, but it had already been proven that she would wander off given thirty seconds unobserved and immediately locate the most dangerous human being on the continent, so it seemed to be an ill-advised course of action.
Instead, he politely averted his eyes and tried to forget that there was a half-naked woman in the room until she rather testily informed him that she was finished.
"Do you have any wounds that are not readily apparent?" The set of her shoulders was stiff as he went about painstakingly sanitizing every little slice into her skin. It looked as though Konan had rained down attacks from above—the top of her head and shoulders had by far the worst of it, although she was permanently missing a small slice out of her left ear.
"I think I might have a concussion," she offered grudgingly, clearly trying not to look at him.
Itachi attempted not to dwell on the fact that she could hide her discomfort around the most dangerous man in the world but trembled at his touch. He instead concentrated to summon the little tinge of medical chakra into his right palm and gently passed it over her scalp, combing through the drying hair carefully and avoiding sealing up any cuts he had yet to sanitize. There was a technique that provided merely diagnostic feedback, but he had yet to acquire it, so he had to make do.
What he found was beyond his abilities. "You are technically correct in that you have a concussion, but it is not so simple. You are experiencing a brain hemorrhage and the swelling will soon become severe." His pronouncement was dispassionate, but he was already off in thought, discarding possible solutions. He could only conclude, "We have no medic who can treat this."
"You don't, huh." Her voice was oddly toneless. "Am I correct in thinking that a lack of treatment may result in permanent loss of brain function?"
"Probable," he agreed, a little perplexed that she was taking this so calmly. "Although stroke or death are also possible."
"I see." She clipped the words together. That seemed to be all she had to say, so he quietly went back to his work, extracting bits of dirt she had missed on her back especially and sanitizing everything before he went back and took the opportunity to practice his mastery of the mystical palm technique, prioritizing the deeper gouges in her hands and wrists that may restrict her movements.
Should he offer to help her escape? She already knew that he was a double agent. The words stuck in his throat when he tried to summon them, however. It was far too dangerous to say such a thing in this place, and he did not see how he could possibly return her to Konoha without implicating himself. As abhorrent as it was to cause harm to another person even through inaction, his mission was far more valuable than her life and safety to Konoha as a whole. Akatsuki was going to perform their second extraction tomorrow and add the two-tailed beast to the statue with the eight-tailed beast when the other members returned to the base. He would have to be present for this event, and the girl would either be locked up or unconscious for the duration to reduce possible complications.
…Probably both, given her obvious propensity for troublemaking.
Then again, if she knew anything at all about the sealing procedure, she would know that no one would be available to watch her. The Uzumaki child was not without intelligence. It was both her best chance and completely hopeless.
Perhaps she had something up her sleeve. At least he could offer a little information and see if she could help herself. "Do not expect further assistance. I will not be available to re-treat your wounds tomorrow. I will be recovering my full chakra capacity in anticipation of the day's events."
The evaluating way she gazed up at him was reassurance enough that she could read between the lines to what he was actually conveying, so it was acceptable that she gave no reply.
"I knew you two would have fun together," Kisame observed from the door. Itachi did not bother to reply, letting his hands fall back to his side and turning to face the taller man. She could keep the patchwork map of scratches. They were not life-threatening, and not worth the effort of healing.
His blank expression seemed to fuel Kisame's amusement. "I don't know what I'm interrupting, but apparently I'm the babysitter, red." He bared his teeth at the Uzumaki girl, but didn't let his gaze leave Itachi. "So you can relax for a while, Itachi."
He gave a small nod. That was acceptable. If the girl was to attempt to escape, he did not want to be forced to thwart it or risk being suspected of complicity. It was best to be as far away as possible. "Of course."
~~~
'Well, hell. That's not good at all.' Her hands were trembling, so she pressed them into her lap and tried to ignore the S-class missing nin eying her like she was a particularly interesting insect. She didn't have the energy to care about Kisame right now, or even to be relieved that Itachi had finally left her alone.
Aiko had just received rather bad news, after all.
Her mind was the one weapon she could not do without. She had already judged that it was far too hazardous to risk using Hiraishin in this state with the easy assumption that a few days' time at the absolute most would rectify the situation. Then she could rattle off an insult to whatever Akatsuki was lurking about and go home a hero with two jinchuuriki in tow.
'Or I might only have their bodies, and then I'd have to make sure we all permanently disappear,' the creep of doubt that she'd been ignoring piped up insidiously. Before now she had been able to ignore it, but it seemed much more real and probable now that she had both a tight deadline imposed by the rapidly approaching time when the Akatsuki would gather to extract one of the bijuu complicated by her body's pathetic weakness.
But she didn't want to die. Not for stupid fucking Konoha.
That left only one recourse, then. She had to try to escape. The plan was hardly complicated: her only chance was to hope like hell that she could still use Hiraishin, steal the jinchuuriki, and leave.
"Hey, red." An enormous foot nudged her ribs none too gently, drawing her attention up to the man in the room with her. "I don't appreciate being ignored."
"Sorry, blue," she replied automatically, blinking up at the toothy behemoth hovering over her. He just grunted, and then thoroughly creeped her out by leaning in and sniffing her hair. Aiko froze.
His breath was hot on the back of her neck when he grunted, "You stink like Itachi's cheap soap."
She tried not to let her mind dwell on the fact that the Uchiha bastard apparently didn't even use shampoo and his hair was a hundred times nicer than hers. That big dumb butt. Unknowingly, she pouted, puffing out her cheeks irritably.
"Well, I'm supposed to do this every hour or so, and I'm already behind," Kisame sighed, soft rustling sounds behind her clueing Aiko in that he was doing something.
"Do what?" she asked a little suspiciously, swiveling just enough to see that the very tip of his sword was unwrapped before he rested it on her shoulder. The weight nearly bowled her over, but it was the sensation of tiny needles in her flesh that made her mindlessly jerk to push the weapon away.
He caught her wrist, and it seemed pitifully small in his gigantic paw. "I wouldn't touch her if I were you," Kisame cautioned in a rumble with a strange undertone she couldn't quite identify. "She only likes me enough to tolerate touching. You might lose a hand or more."
That sounded like a massive bummer, so Aiko just tried to shrink away from the blade bulging obscenely against her flesh. It followed her movements. Finally, she gave up. "Why are you using me as a shelf?" Aiko managed to force out, feeling so much worse than she had a moment ago, even discounting the blood trickling down the flesh Itachi had just healed.
"Pein-sama seems to think you're dangerous," he informed her lightly, pulling the blade away nonchalantly while she tried to catch her breath, gripping her stomach with both arms. "I happen to be an expert at draining a person's chakra to exactly what they need and leave them none for daring escape plans."
"Ah," Aiko huffed out, vision flickering slightly. "The joke is on you, then. My daring escape plan requires no chakra at all. I'm going to impersonate you and walk right out of here."
He threw his head back and laughed. Then he scooped her up like she was a kitten and cradled her with a single arm, striding out of Deidara's room with two long steps and back up a vaguely familiar hallway. "How do you intend to do that, red?"
"I was going to beat you up with just taijutsu, switch our clothes and then tell Itachi I'm going out for ice cream," she mumbled, feeling her head sag against his chest despite her best efforts.
"Well, you'll need some fuel for that," Kisame informed her mock-seriously, kicking out a wooden chair and settling her into it with surprising gentleness from such a large, scary-looking person. "I'm afraid that protein would help you re-build your chakra levels, so you'll have to settle for rice porridge. It's the only other thing I can cook."
She might have fallen asleep, but Aiko vaguely remembered noting that he put an ungodly amount of honey into the steaming bowl he set in front of her.
"Hey, can you walk, red? I don't want to stand around while you eat."
Aiko gave it a valiant attempt, but ended up nearly sliding under the table when her attempt to push her chair back failed.
"I will take that as a no." She blinked, and then she was picked up just the same as before, dazedly blinking at the bowl in his massive fingers while he walked outside. Aiko found herself propped up against the building with the hot bowl on her legs. He ruffled her hair fondly before straightening to his full height. "I have energy to burn, so you're going to watch me train. I agreed to keep you out of trouble, not play nursemaid."
Her tongue felt heavy and dry in her mouth, but he hadn't thought to bring her a drink. Aiko dubiously glanced down at the food she'd been allotted. She felt so weak and queasy that eating sounded like the last thing she wanted to do, but it could only help improve her condition. There was absolutely no chance that she could escape in this condition, and she had no idea how long it had been since she had eaten. Her physical state would only get worse the longer she went without caloric intake.
She nearly gagged at the heat and sweetness, but forced it all down. Oddly, she felt incrementally better within minutes: good enough to pay some attention to what Kisame was doing. It was actually rather interesting, from a professional standpoint. He was sparring with four water clones on a shallow lake of his own creation, dodging what had to be at least B level techniques from all of them that did things like boil the water, attempt to drag him down, or hit him with anything from man-sized sharks made of water to concussive bullets like what she used.
"You know, you're the first really strong water-type I've met," Aiko mused aloud. The statement hadn't been intended to flatter, but he looked proud nonetheless.
"You haven't seen nothing yet, itty bitty. I'll do this jutsu with just the chakra I got from you."
'I really wish I could focus enough to remember those handsigns,' she thought blearily. At this point, she wouldn't even certain that she was seeing them all. Thoughts of memorizing them so she could steal his toy were completely lost when she realized that he was forming a gigantic tank of water in the air that towered over the entire building she was pressed up against, sides as flat as if there was glass to keep them in despite the fact that she could see the liquid was raging in a vicious current. Whoa. He was standing on the top of the rapidly rising water, and tossed her one last look that implied he never got tired of showing off before he grinned and started working on another series of handsigns.
"This area is all under my control," he informed in a half-shout, rolling his shoulders menacingly. "It's impossible to escape, but right now, anyone who can walk on water would be fine. I could trap them in a water prison while their movement is constricted, but that gets old. This is how I drag my victims to the bottom, or tear them apart."
The water lurched and—were those twenty foot sharks circling in the water to create a whirlpool? They definitely were, and there were too many moving too quickly for her to count. Just trying to follow their movement gave her a headache.
Her priorities quickly changed when the 'sides' of the tank suddenly disappeared, and several thousand tons of water came rushing at her with a swarming mass of angry looking sharks on the top. She had just enough time to think, 'oh shit' before Kisame scooped her up with a laugh and landed easily on top of the building, grinning at he looked over the swamp that he had just formed.
"Don't worry, I'll keep you safe. Poor itty bitty." A massive hand tweaked her nose, and he laughed again when her eyes crossed.
"Where is the water going?" she changed the subject, embarrassed that she'd frozen. It was disappearing with an almost shocking haste, and there had been an enormous amount of it- easily six times what she could make.
'Did he really use just my chakra? He must be so much more efficient with it than I am.' Contemplatively, she glanced down at the enormous trunk of an arm that was supporting her. He just didn't look like a guy who cared to use finesse.
"Pein-sama installed a drain system," Kisame admitted carelessly, jumping back down on top of the draining liquid and heading towards the other side of the building he had just abused. "My jutsu practice supplies the water for the base."
Aiko blanched. It was a pretty big building, and he was just one man.
'These are the types of people I'm dealing with,' she remembered with a sinking feeling. 'I can't fight on a level ground against any of them.'
It was dreary and rather dark out, but it was difficult to gauge the time because it sort of looked like the sky was always that way in Ame. She was pretty sure she was in Ame. The rest of the night wasn't terribly eventful, but it must have been evening at least because Kisame only drained her chakra three more times before he set her on Deidara's bed, patted her head like she was a kitten, and then locked her in for the night.
'I really might die here,' she realized with dawning horror the first time that he came in and woke her up by draining her chakra again before shuffling away in his pajamas. That hadn't seemed real before. She always got out of sticky situations. Being slippery was like, her thing. But they really were doing a professional job: When Kisame said he was going to drain her chakra every hour, he really fucking meant it. She drifted between a haze of sleep and unconsciousness all night, and felt like absolute crap in the morning.
The thought that the jinchuuriki were probably worse off than she was… was not reassuring. They almost certainly weren't being fed because Akatsuki was going to kill at least one of them sometime that day. There would have been no point. So they were probably being kept drugged into unconsciousness to prevent any struggles. That would be what Aiko would have done. That meant that they probably would have something of a fighting chance if allowed to wake, she hoped, since they'd have their chakra.
Good and bad. If they were capable and decided to work with her, that would work in her favor. If they were in better condition than she was and still wanted her dead, she would be screwed and very possibly vulnerable. That was one of the reasons that she decided she could only go to Konoha—yes, if it turned out that Fuu or Nii was still hostile, they would claim Konoha had done the original kidnapping and just tried to trick them. That was bad. But being alone in the middle of nowhere with two possible hostiles was far worse, and she desperately needed medical attention and safety. Aside from being where she felt safest, Konoha had the best hospital and medics in the known world.
"Feeding time, for Samehada first, and then you," Kisame promised cheerily, flinging her door open. Aiko winced and wished that hiding under the sheets was a valid tactical strategy.
True to his word the day before, there was none of the meat or nuts that she was craving frantically when Kisame fed her in the morning. She tried not to glare or let her head hit the table when a goddamn salad was put in front of her while Kisame settled down with miso, rice, and four fish.
It was a perfectly good salad… a bizarrely good salad, if she were to be honest. Kisame apparently didn't believe in dressing, but he did believe in spinach, mandarin oranges, grapes, tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers. She could see the logic behind the composition—a lot of iron to help her replace her lost blood, and a variety of nutrients from other sources. It still wasn't answering the insane craving in her bones for something she could turn into pure life energy.
'I am going to escape, go home, and eat half a goddamn cow,' Aiko promised herself, because the alternative was to lay down and die. For now, she ate the entire salad and asked for seconds. She got more sweetened rice. What the hell was up with this man and sweetened rice?
Still, this was probably the best that she was going to feel. It had been almost an hour since Kisame had last drained her chakra. She had no idea when they were planning on performing the extractions, and they probably wouldn't be so helpful as to tell her. Really, they probably wouldn't be so obliging as to leave her conscious and unobserved while they got to work. If they had any sense at all, the first order of business would be to knock her the fuck out so she couldn't use the chakra she would be accumulating while they were too busy to pay attention to her.
So she experimentally rolled her ankles under the table and looked up at Kisame endearingly. "Thank you for breakfast, blue-san. You know, you seem out of place here. How did you end up working in chateau crazy?"
He stared. "You think I seem like the sanest person here?" he clarified gingerly. At her nod, he shook his head slowly. "Well, that's a new one. Usually the assumption is that Itachi is least likely to peel someone's face off and wear it to bed. No offence, red, but I don't feel like talking about it."
"That's fair," she admitted evenly, propping her chin up on her hands and feeling around for the two Hiraishin seals she was most concerned with at the moment. They were in the same locations she had originally noted when she first woke up. Aside from feeling tired, she was almost used to the constant splitting headache and fatigue from chakra exhaustion. She could do this. "I just thought I should ask before I enact my daring escape plan and all," she teased with a smile, scrunching up her nose. Oddly, he didn't seem to take the warning seriously at all. "You know, if you ever decide you want to make a break from these nutjobs, I will totally hide you in my apartment if you agree to teach me how to be completely and utterly terrifying with water jutsu. I've always wanted to be internationally feared." She gave a real sigh of longing.
"As appealing as the thought of being confined to a teenager's apartment is, I think I will have to pass on that one," he rejoined dryly, sticking his chopsticks in his now-empty bowl and leaning back slightly. "I'm flattered, though."
"Well, I'm sure that Tsunade-sama would let me bring you in legally if I asked, but I was hoping I wouldn't have to share," she pouted mock-regretfully. He was by far the most impressive master of water jutsu she had ever used, and given half a chance to learn from him, she would walk over broken glass to do it.
Still, there were pretty shinobi princesses to rescue, less sucky places to be, and meat to sink her teeth into. That sort of thing. Shouldn't dawdle.
Kisame snorted, looking almost fond of her. "You're a weird kid."
"And you're surprisingly cool," she countered, locking onto the signature that she thought was Fuu. It was hard to tell which of the other woman disliked her more, but at least Fuu was more frightened of her than angry with her. Hopefully, she would be willing to listen and cooperate to save her own skin. "So long, and thanks for all the fish," she added with a pointed look at the fish he had definitely not shared. He was just making a confused expression when she yanked on Fuu's chakra signature—and found herself falling to the ground, clutching at her aching head. If anyone else was there, she had no idea and she was completely at their mercy, because the pain was unbearable.
The first thing she noticed when her vision returned from 'white' and the feeling had changed to a throb instead of an electric current that consumed her being was that she was crying on her hands and knees. The second thing was that Fuu was conscious but badly beaten, and chained to a wall. She also looked somewhat alarmed.
Aiko had to purposefully wipe away latent curiosity about just awful she must look judging by Fuu's expression. "Sorry about that," she slurred. Oh. Embarrassing. Was she drooling? She wiped the side of her mouth. Well, it wasn't drool. Wasn't sure if blood is better or not, so she put the thought aside for later. "I don't know about you, but I think we should rescue ourselves. How does a jail break sound?"
"You look like shit," the other girl said bluntly, before pointedly tugging on her wrists. "And I doubt you can break these."
"No need, I'll just grab you. Um." She hesitated, feeling like throwing up, but forced it down. "Nii Yugito is the next stop, and then we blow this popsicle stand. If that happens again, can you watch my back while I recover? Am bleeding in the brain," Aiko explained, waving at the general area of her head as she lurched forward to wrap her arms around Fuu's waist. She looked like she'd been through hell, but that the aforementioned hell had happened several days ago. To a normal person, that would make little difference, but it was a different matter entirely when applied to a jinchuuriki. The cuffs were the awful kind that stopped chakra circulation, which made some sense to a distant part of her brain. But now was not the time to stop and think, and the ability to do more than one thing at once was apparently no longer something she could do.
"Of course," Fuu murmured from above her. "If you can really get me out of here."
"Hold on tight," Aiko huffed, despite that not making any sense at all since she was the one holding onto Fuu. Concentrating on taking just Fuu and not the metal touching her limbs was shockingly difficult for something she didn't usually have to think about, but she managed.
' One more to rescue. If I wasn't more concerned that Yugito might attack me on sight, I would have gotten her first and probably left Fuu for dead once I realized how hard this was going to be. She's much more politically important.'
Didn't matter now. She tenuously gripped the Hiraishin seal that was closest- and by closest, she really did mean closest by an enormous margin. At least the two jinchuuriki were closer together than she had been to Fuu. Maybe this wouldn't be so terrible. She only had to make two more Hiraishin. Go to Yugito, go home. She could do it. She could do dozens within seconds at her best. This was nothing.
But the seal slipped out of her grip. That had never happened before, even when she was first learning. Frustrated, she attempted to lock in on it again—and succeeded this time.
When the ringing in her ears stopped, the first thing she knew was that she was making an awful wailing sound and it hurt her throat. Aiko stopped immediately and tried to push herself up, noting that her vision appeared to be shot. It was far worse than the double vision she had first woken up to in the Akatsuki base where even now pursuants were likely mobilizing. How long had she been disabled by that travel?
Of course, it was worse than she realized.
"I thought you were dead," Aiko croaked out at the foul-mouthed blur that Fuu appeared to be fighting. Hidan (she was pretty sure that was who it was) responded with an obnoxious laugh.
"Hey, you're that bitch who'd heard about Jashin! Did you come to convert, or just to donate your body to the cause? I might have fucked you before, but you look like total shit now. Still, Jashin accepts all forms of fucked-up ugly whores. Equal in his sight and all that shit."
"Yeah, that's him," she muttered to herself, struggling to her feet. Odd. Was the floor really moving, or was she seasick for some other reason? "Yugito?" she called out plaintively. "Are you here?"
The response was raspy, as if she was breathing through a lungful of blood. "the fuck happened to you, Uzumaki? I'm right here."
"Okay, good," she mumbled, awkwardly fisting a handful of the clothing she felt when she stumbled in the direction of the familiar voice. "You're not tied or anything, right?"
There was a brief silence from the only other person not involved in a fight. When it came, Yugito sounded a bit unnerved. "No. I was just uncuffed by this asshole."
"Cool." She stood as straight as she could in the disorienting blur of colors that had become her perception, and wrapped her trembling arm around what felt like Yugito's waist. They had to go, they had to move. Beating Hidan was pointless and would just give reinforcements time to show up. "Fuu?" she called out plaintively, hoping the older girl would know what she wanted. Aiko was almost surprised by how weak her own voice sounded.
A heartbeat later, a thin arm was around her waist. "I'm here, move!" Fuu barked out. Aiko obeyed thoughtlessly, thinking of nothing but home. She wanted the seal in her bedroom but really Tsunade's office would be a better choice, she would meet a medic there and this all could get sorted out, it was going to be okay.
But when she came back, cheek lying in what seemed to be mud and her own bile, Aiko felt raindrops on her body. "Please, god, tell me we're out of Ame," she choked out, not bothering to suppress tears. Everything hurt, and the blurs of colors had turned to shades of red that were completely useless for navigating. There was a hand on her shoulder—Yugito, she thought, because that was where the older woman's voice came from.
"No, we aren't. But we can wait a moment for you to feel better and run from here."
She sobbed openly, pushing herself up to her knees and palms. Her head shook. "No, we can't," Aiko frantically explained, just wishing this nightmare would end already. "He uses rain like I do to sense. They know where we are. If we're in the rain, they're coming directly to us. We have to go. Please, god, work this time," she wailed, not even noticing that she was reverting to English. "One more. One more." Blindly, she reached out, feeling for Fuu. "I need to touch both of you so we can go again."
"Uzumaki, you're going to kill yourself!" Yugito spat out, sounding—odd, was she sounding concerned? But didn't she hate Aiko?
"I might, but if I don't, we're all dead," she wheezed. Only the sensation of heat on her cheeks let her know that tears were mixed in with the rainwater. "I think I have one more in me."
No one answered her, but arms were wrapped around her torso from both sides.
Aiko took a moment to hope that neither of them would take the opportunity to kill her. It wouldn't be hard now. Honestly, at this point, she didn't think there was any chance she could make the trip to Konoha. But she had to try.
And she pulled on the seal in Tsunade's office one more time with everything she had. Literally everything—she was unconscious before she hit the ground again somewhere new.