(no subject)
A couple of filled prompts for the "Three Times" meme over at naruto_meme. :)
Prompt: Three times Kisame broke Itachi's nose.
Rating: K+
Genre: Humour
1. Kisame grips the tree roots near his head, sweating bullets and grinding his teeth as Itachi rips open his cloak and tries to staunch the bleeding.
The Mist nin had collapsed fifteen minutes after taking a hit to the stomach, falling to the forest floor outside Kusagakure as they fled the village shinobi and their barrage of poisoned weapons.
The pain between his ribs is excruciating and the burning sensation that radiates over the expanse of his chest makes him realize the venom is spreading.
“Take it out,” Kisame says through gritted teeth, feeling the tree root splinter in his hand as Itachi touches the hilt of the weapon. “Do it quick.”
A moment’s exploration of the wound and Itachi speaks, voice grim. “It's barbed. If we remove it, we will have to return to headquarters immediately.”
“I don’t care,” Kisame bites out, deciding he’ll deal with Pain’s wrath later. “Just do it.”
Without preamble, the Uchiha grips the hilt of the weapon and yanks. In the instinctive urge to double over and clutch his stomach, Kisame sits up so fast his forehead collides directly with Itachi’s face.
Itachi rears back, clutching his nose, and Kisame shakes away the daze before looking up at him.
“Oh,” he says, realizing what he’s done. “Is it broken?”
“Yes,” Itachi says thickly, blood seeping through his fingers.
Kisame has the decency to look abashed. “Look, I’m-”
Itachi shakes his head and stands up, swaying slightly before continuing onwards towards River Country. “I’ll live.”
2. It’s no secret Itachi’s going blind, but the Uchiha goes about handling his disability with such dignity and poise that sometimes Kisame forgets how vulnerable his partner gets after a round or two of using his mangekyou sharingan.
They haven’t slept in two days and even Kisame is feeling his chakra reserves running low, so they decide to spend the night in a motel in Iwa.
Jinchuuriki-hunting is hard work, Kisame realizes with a groan as he sinks onto his lumpy mattress, especially when the pay is poor enough to only afford the most basic of amenities.
The motel is three stories tall and the elevator is broken when they get there. The only available room is on the third floor and Kisame had found himself ready to collapse after climbing the three long flights of rickety stairs.
Itachi stands in the doorway, rubbing his eyes discreetly, and peers down the long staircase near their room. “I will go check the perimeter.”
Kisame grunts in response and closes his eyes.
There is a pause. “How many steps are there?”
“Twenty-one,” Kisame mumbles. At least I think there are.
Itachi says nothing and steps outside, closing the door behind him. Through the cheap wooden door, he can hear Itachi slowly descending the steps.
…17, 18, 19, 20-
Then there is a stumbling noise and something that sounds like someone face-planting into the wall. A few unsteady, heavy footfalls follow, and then they slowly climb back up the stairs.
Kisame looks up when the door opens, wincing when Itachi walks in with his head down and his fingers pinching his nose to stem the blood flow.
He doesn’t even look at Kisame and heads straight for the bathroom. “There were twenty.”
3. They don’t kill civilians as often as popular opinion holds, as it’s a good way of attracting unwanted attention and it’s much easier just avoiding them in the first place. But when they make a short stop in a small fishing village near peaceful Wave Country, some teenage girl makes a pass at Itachi and screams “pervert!” as revenge for his polite dismissal.
Suddenly there are a bunch of fishermen chasing them with pitchforks and the two are too tired to run all the way to the next village when they had planned to spend the night here, anyway.
So they lead the mob to the edge of the village, hoping with a degree of pessimism that the villagers will give up the chase. But the men are either overreacting in their anger or are just looking for an excuse to beat them for a lark, as they don’t give up and follow them to the outskirts.
There is only one old house left near the path leading out of the village and Itachi comes to an abrupt stop when he nears it. Kisame stops next to him, rolling his eyes at the sound of the angry mob in pursuit and looks at Itachi questioningly.
His partner stands there and seems to be considering something. At last, Itachi turns and looks resignedly at Kisame.
“Hit me.”
Kisame blinks. “What?”
Itachi’s voice is as toneless as ever but there’s a dull sort of acceptance there that Kisame can’t help but laugh at. “Do it.”
Kisame shrugs, balls his fist, and clocks the Uchiha one in the face.
Naturally he tries to restrain himself, but it’s hard to gauge his own strength and Itachi takes an ungainly step backwards, wobbling and clutching his nose.
When he removes his hand, his entire upper lip and chin are covered in blood and he turns towards the house. Catching on, Kisame accompanies him to the door and knocks, bringing his hand up to rest on Itachi’s shoulder.
The door opens and a wrinkled old lady gasps at the sight of them.
“Sorry to disturb you,” Kisame says with a grin, patting Itachi on the back. “But my friend here had a little accident. Could you perhaps lend us a tissue?”
The old woman drags them both inside, hauling Itachi over to the kitchen chair and fussing over his face as Kisame peers through the window and sees the mob rush by.
“You boys shouldn’t play so rough!” she admonishes. Kisame turns around in time to see her tilt Itachi’s head back over the top of the chair and press a bag of crushed ice to his nose. “Now look at what’s happened to this handsome young man. It would be a shame if he ruined his nose.”
“A real shame,” Kisame agrees, sitting across from him and grinning. “We’ll try not to let it happen again.”
**********
Prompt: Three times the Akatsuki have turned to various side-projects to support their criminal lifestyle.
Rating: T
Genre: Humour
1. "If you don't mind," Deidara said through gritted teeth, trying to resist exploding the room and everything in it, "could you hold still for just one minute?"
The large, buxom woman reclining on the chaise spared him a look of utter disdain. "I'm paying you five hundred thousand ryou just to sit there and paint, but since that clearly isn't enough to spare me your whining..."
She reached into her cleavage and flung a crumpled ball of money at him. It bounced off Deidara's forehead.
"Consider that an added tip," she said snidely.
The paintbrush snapped in his hand but he somehow fought back the urge to annihilate the woman right then and there. Instead, he withdrew another brush to finish painting the picture.
An hour later, he was done, and though painting was not exactly his forte in the realm of visual art, he thought it was a decent and accurate representation.
Unfortunately, his client didn't think so.
She swelled up like a bullfrog and pointed indignantly at the picture. "What is the meaning of that?"
"What?" Deidara said, feigning polite puzzlement. "Your double chin?"
“You call yourself a painter? This is atrocious!”
“Yeah, well, I’d sculpt you, but I’d run out of clay halfway, un.”
“You charlatan! You hack! My buttocks aren’t that big! You purposely made it look that way-”
Deidara finally lost his temper. “If you had a single working cell in your head, you’d see it’s not me, but your fat ass that makes your ass look fat!”
Pain and Konan looked up from their game of chess when they heard an enraged scream from the room next door, followed by the sound of something crashing and someone stomping out the back door.
A moment later, Deidara emerged from the room with the canvas broken over his head and paint dripping down his cloak. He wordlessly tossed the cash onto the table and strode past, muttering.
“If you need me, I’ll be in the shower, un.”
2. “Of all the medical professions,” Kakuzu explained to the rest of Akatsuki during their biweekly staff meetings, “heart surgeons make the most money. I forged a degree and I’m on-call starting tomorrow.”
Tobi’s hand shot up into the air.
Kakuzu looked at him wearily. “What, Tobi?”
“But Kakuzu-san, don’t you need to go to medical school to do that sort of thing?”
“Like hell,” Hidan snorted from his spot by the fireplace. “Kakuzu’s an asshole but he knows his shit. Put me back together enough times.”
“And he has personal experience in transplanting hearts,” Pain added, nodding in approval. “This will work well.”
24 hours later.
The electrocardiograph beeped slowly and incessantly in the background as Kakuzu stood over the surgery table in his blue scrubs and plastic gloves. He stared blankly at the sawed-open ribcage and the pulsating red mass in the centre of the patient’s chest.
“Doctor?” the nurse said nervously. “Would you like to begin with the blockage?”
Kakuzu wordlessly took the scalpel she handed him, then slowly lowered it towards the beating heart.
A single incision later, the nurse screamed when a spurt of blood hit the Falls nin in the eye and he stumbled back holding the no-longer-beating heart in his right hand.
“Oh my God!” cried the anaesthesiologist.
“Holy shit!” yelped the perfusionist.
“Shut up!” Kakuzu roared, and killed everyone in the room.
Two hours later, Kisame opened the door to the hideout, his pocky stick falling out of his mouth when a blood-soaked Kakuzu shoved a tray of stolen surgical tools into his arms and trudged past him.
“We can hawk the tools,” he said gruffly. “If you need me, I’ll be in the shower.”
3. “This is honestly the worst idea we’ve ever had,” Kisame said thoughtfully as Konan helped Itachi into his boots.
“We’ll do what we have to while money’s tight,” Kakuzu said, peering out the changing room door. “Itachi, two minutes.”
The Uchiha said nothing and merely continued getting dressed, blank-faced and holding out an arm for Hidan to yank a glove over and a leg for Konan to strap a holster to.
Deidara was sitting in the corner of the room, unsure whether to be repulsed, sympathetic or gleeful over Itachi’s predicament, so he settled for an expression somewhere between a grin and a constipated grimace.
Sasori pinched some of the pants’ fabric between his fingers and tugged experimentally. “It’s too tight,” he informed them flatly. “He will have trouble moving his limbs.”
“It’s all right,” Pain said with a wave of his hand. “He won’t be wearing it for long, anyway.”
At long last, Itachi was ready. He slowly turned to face them, legs taut and rigid in his red leather pants and shoulders constricted in a tight-fitting leather vest. Black glittering stars embellished the ensemble and a garish red bandana was tied around his neck. For the finishing touch, Zetsu came forward and placed the black felt cowboy hat on his head.
The rest of them stared at him.
Itachi stared back.
Then, solemnly, Pain raised his hand in a salute and the others followed. “We appreciate your sacrifice.”
Itachi merely nodded and began waddling in an ungainly manner towards the Chippendale’s stage.
“Is there anything else you need, Itachi?” Konan asked concernedly.
Itachi stopped at the door and sighed. “Yes.”
He pushed the door open and emerged to a horde of screaming women. “Keep the bathroom vacant. I will need a shower after this.”
Prompt: Three times Kisame broke Itachi's nose.
Rating: K+
Genre: Humour
1. Kisame grips the tree roots near his head, sweating bullets and grinding his teeth as Itachi rips open his cloak and tries to staunch the bleeding.
The Mist nin had collapsed fifteen minutes after taking a hit to the stomach, falling to the forest floor outside Kusagakure as they fled the village shinobi and their barrage of poisoned weapons.
The pain between his ribs is excruciating and the burning sensation that radiates over the expanse of his chest makes him realize the venom is spreading.
“Take it out,” Kisame says through gritted teeth, feeling the tree root splinter in his hand as Itachi touches the hilt of the weapon. “Do it quick.”
A moment’s exploration of the wound and Itachi speaks, voice grim. “It's barbed. If we remove it, we will have to return to headquarters immediately.”
“I don’t care,” Kisame bites out, deciding he’ll deal with Pain’s wrath later. “Just do it.”
Without preamble, the Uchiha grips the hilt of the weapon and yanks. In the instinctive urge to double over and clutch his stomach, Kisame sits up so fast his forehead collides directly with Itachi’s face.
Itachi rears back, clutching his nose, and Kisame shakes away the daze before looking up at him.
“Oh,” he says, realizing what he’s done. “Is it broken?”
“Yes,” Itachi says thickly, blood seeping through his fingers.
Kisame has the decency to look abashed. “Look, I’m-”
Itachi shakes his head and stands up, swaying slightly before continuing onwards towards River Country. “I’ll live.”
2. It’s no secret Itachi’s going blind, but the Uchiha goes about handling his disability with such dignity and poise that sometimes Kisame forgets how vulnerable his partner gets after a round or two of using his mangekyou sharingan.
They haven’t slept in two days and even Kisame is feeling his chakra reserves running low, so they decide to spend the night in a motel in Iwa.
Jinchuuriki-hunting is hard work, Kisame realizes with a groan as he sinks onto his lumpy mattress, especially when the pay is poor enough to only afford the most basic of amenities.
The motel is three stories tall and the elevator is broken when they get there. The only available room is on the third floor and Kisame had found himself ready to collapse after climbing the three long flights of rickety stairs.
Itachi stands in the doorway, rubbing his eyes discreetly, and peers down the long staircase near their room. “I will go check the perimeter.”
Kisame grunts in response and closes his eyes.
There is a pause. “How many steps are there?”
“Twenty-one,” Kisame mumbles. At least I think there are.
Itachi says nothing and steps outside, closing the door behind him. Through the cheap wooden door, he can hear Itachi slowly descending the steps.
…17, 18, 19, 20-
Then there is a stumbling noise and something that sounds like someone face-planting into the wall. A few unsteady, heavy footfalls follow, and then they slowly climb back up the stairs.
Kisame looks up when the door opens, wincing when Itachi walks in with his head down and his fingers pinching his nose to stem the blood flow.
He doesn’t even look at Kisame and heads straight for the bathroom. “There were twenty.”
3. They don’t kill civilians as often as popular opinion holds, as it’s a good way of attracting unwanted attention and it’s much easier just avoiding them in the first place. But when they make a short stop in a small fishing village near peaceful Wave Country, some teenage girl makes a pass at Itachi and screams “pervert!” as revenge for his polite dismissal.
Suddenly there are a bunch of fishermen chasing them with pitchforks and the two are too tired to run all the way to the next village when they had planned to spend the night here, anyway.
So they lead the mob to the edge of the village, hoping with a degree of pessimism that the villagers will give up the chase. But the men are either overreacting in their anger or are just looking for an excuse to beat them for a lark, as they don’t give up and follow them to the outskirts.
There is only one old house left near the path leading out of the village and Itachi comes to an abrupt stop when he nears it. Kisame stops next to him, rolling his eyes at the sound of the angry mob in pursuit and looks at Itachi questioningly.
His partner stands there and seems to be considering something. At last, Itachi turns and looks resignedly at Kisame.
“Hit me.”
Kisame blinks. “What?”
Itachi’s voice is as toneless as ever but there’s a dull sort of acceptance there that Kisame can’t help but laugh at. “Do it.”
Kisame shrugs, balls his fist, and clocks the Uchiha one in the face.
Naturally he tries to restrain himself, but it’s hard to gauge his own strength and Itachi takes an ungainly step backwards, wobbling and clutching his nose.
When he removes his hand, his entire upper lip and chin are covered in blood and he turns towards the house. Catching on, Kisame accompanies him to the door and knocks, bringing his hand up to rest on Itachi’s shoulder.
The door opens and a wrinkled old lady gasps at the sight of them.
“Sorry to disturb you,” Kisame says with a grin, patting Itachi on the back. “But my friend here had a little accident. Could you perhaps lend us a tissue?”
The old woman drags them both inside, hauling Itachi over to the kitchen chair and fussing over his face as Kisame peers through the window and sees the mob rush by.
“You boys shouldn’t play so rough!” she admonishes. Kisame turns around in time to see her tilt Itachi’s head back over the top of the chair and press a bag of crushed ice to his nose. “Now look at what’s happened to this handsome young man. It would be a shame if he ruined his nose.”
“A real shame,” Kisame agrees, sitting across from him and grinning. “We’ll try not to let it happen again.”
**********
Prompt: Three times the Akatsuki have turned to various side-projects to support their criminal lifestyle.
Rating: T
Genre: Humour
1. "If you don't mind," Deidara said through gritted teeth, trying to resist exploding the room and everything in it, "could you hold still for just one minute?"
The large, buxom woman reclining on the chaise spared him a look of utter disdain. "I'm paying you five hundred thousand ryou just to sit there and paint, but since that clearly isn't enough to spare me your whining..."
She reached into her cleavage and flung a crumpled ball of money at him. It bounced off Deidara's forehead.
"Consider that an added tip," she said snidely.
The paintbrush snapped in his hand but he somehow fought back the urge to annihilate the woman right then and there. Instead, he withdrew another brush to finish painting the picture.
An hour later, he was done, and though painting was not exactly his forte in the realm of visual art, he thought it was a decent and accurate representation.
Unfortunately, his client didn't think so.
She swelled up like a bullfrog and pointed indignantly at the picture. "What is the meaning of that?"
"What?" Deidara said, feigning polite puzzlement. "Your double chin?"
“You call yourself a painter? This is atrocious!”
“Yeah, well, I’d sculpt you, but I’d run out of clay halfway, un.”
“You charlatan! You hack! My buttocks aren’t that big! You purposely made it look that way-”
Deidara finally lost his temper. “If you had a single working cell in your head, you’d see it’s not me, but your fat ass that makes your ass look fat!”
Pain and Konan looked up from their game of chess when they heard an enraged scream from the room next door, followed by the sound of something crashing and someone stomping out the back door.
A moment later, Deidara emerged from the room with the canvas broken over his head and paint dripping down his cloak. He wordlessly tossed the cash onto the table and strode past, muttering.
“If you need me, I’ll be in the shower, un.”
2. “Of all the medical professions,” Kakuzu explained to the rest of Akatsuki during their biweekly staff meetings, “heart surgeons make the most money. I forged a degree and I’m on-call starting tomorrow.”
Tobi’s hand shot up into the air.
Kakuzu looked at him wearily. “What, Tobi?”
“But Kakuzu-san, don’t you need to go to medical school to do that sort of thing?”
“Like hell,” Hidan snorted from his spot by the fireplace. “Kakuzu’s an asshole but he knows his shit. Put me back together enough times.”
“And he has personal experience in transplanting hearts,” Pain added, nodding in approval. “This will work well.”
24 hours later.
The electrocardiograph beeped slowly and incessantly in the background as Kakuzu stood over the surgery table in his blue scrubs and plastic gloves. He stared blankly at the sawed-open ribcage and the pulsating red mass in the centre of the patient’s chest.
“Doctor?” the nurse said nervously. “Would you like to begin with the blockage?”
Kakuzu wordlessly took the scalpel she handed him, then slowly lowered it towards the beating heart.
A single incision later, the nurse screamed when a spurt of blood hit the Falls nin in the eye and he stumbled back holding the no-longer-beating heart in his right hand.
“Oh my God!” cried the anaesthesiologist.
“Holy shit!” yelped the perfusionist.
“Shut up!” Kakuzu roared, and killed everyone in the room.
Two hours later, Kisame opened the door to the hideout, his pocky stick falling out of his mouth when a blood-soaked Kakuzu shoved a tray of stolen surgical tools into his arms and trudged past him.
“We can hawk the tools,” he said gruffly. “If you need me, I’ll be in the shower.”
3. “This is honestly the worst idea we’ve ever had,” Kisame said thoughtfully as Konan helped Itachi into his boots.
“We’ll do what we have to while money’s tight,” Kakuzu said, peering out the changing room door. “Itachi, two minutes.”
The Uchiha said nothing and merely continued getting dressed, blank-faced and holding out an arm for Hidan to yank a glove over and a leg for Konan to strap a holster to.
Deidara was sitting in the corner of the room, unsure whether to be repulsed, sympathetic or gleeful over Itachi’s predicament, so he settled for an expression somewhere between a grin and a constipated grimace.
Sasori pinched some of the pants’ fabric between his fingers and tugged experimentally. “It’s too tight,” he informed them flatly. “He will have trouble moving his limbs.”
“It’s all right,” Pain said with a wave of his hand. “He won’t be wearing it for long, anyway.”
At long last, Itachi was ready. He slowly turned to face them, legs taut and rigid in his red leather pants and shoulders constricted in a tight-fitting leather vest. Black glittering stars embellished the ensemble and a garish red bandana was tied around his neck. For the finishing touch, Zetsu came forward and placed the black felt cowboy hat on his head.
The rest of them stared at him.
Itachi stared back.
Then, solemnly, Pain raised his hand in a salute and the others followed. “We appreciate your sacrifice.”
Itachi merely nodded and began waddling in an ungainly manner towards the Chippendale’s stage.
“Is there anything else you need, Itachi?” Konan asked concernedly.
Itachi stopped at the door and sighed. “Yes.”
He pushed the door open and emerged to a horde of screaming women. “Keep the bathroom vacant. I will need a shower after this.”