By Nightfall






Four beings stood on the same branch in the largest tree in Konoha.  They looked over the vastly populated city, smiling amongst themselves. It was night at this time. The sky was as black as coal and not a single star shone upon it.
Tobi, Deidara, Kisame, and Itachi all stood on the branch in that order, being a quiet as mice, and keeping their senses keen.
                Tobi picked at a leaf that grew from a twig sticking out of the branch, feeling it between his fingers and finally plucking it off the twig. He gazed over at the others, leaf still in hand, and sighed.

               Honestly, Tobi hated waiting. Because he was still quite young, that was to be expected. For what little kid likes to wait? “Deidara-Sempai…” Tobi whispered to his team-mate. Tobi had been put with Deidara ever since Sasori, Deidara’s former team mate, died. Tobi had often asked Deidara about what had truly occurred in the fight that led to Sasori’s death, but he never got an answer.

            Deidara never had let on about it, but he had been quite upset with Sasori’s death. It had disturbed him greatly, for Sasori was someone he deeply respected as an artist.

           “Hai, what is it, un?” Deidara muttered under his breath, sounding slightly annoyed. Deidara had an unusual habit of grunting at the end of his sentences. He did it quite often, sometimes making it hard to understand him if he was going on and on about something.

“Are we about finished waiting? Tobi is getting tired of standing here.” Tobi said, still pertaining his voice to a quiet whisper.

Deidara mockingly rolled his eyes and looked over at Kisame and Itachi. Kisame seemed to be rather hasty himself, for he was rocking back and forth on his feet and looking above at the treetops. Itachi, however, was the exact opposite. He was maintaining his posture and was looking out at Konoha calmly, his sharingan glowing a deep crimson.

Deidara grunted to himself. ‘He’s always been like that,’ Deidara thought, ‘Itachi is always so concentrated on everything… being as perfect as always I see, un…’ His blond hair ruffled a little under a warm, light wind that passed through the air. His Akatsuki cloak gently swayed and it made Deidara feel like crawling into bed and falling asleep. He yawned and closed his eye for a moment, listening to the world around him. He felt sleep grasp a hold of him and snapped his eye open immediately, trying to focus on his current mission.

Tobi, whose orange and black mask could barely be seen in the darkness, seemed to already be asleep, standing with his back hunched and his arms hanging. Deidara smiled. He was so much like a little kid.

Then he too decided it wouldn’t be that bad if he were to fall asleep, at least for a little while. So he sat down upon the branch and rested his head on his hand, being careful not to damage the little mouth on it. Then he closed his eyes and listened to the sound of the wind, slowly carrying his consciousness away.

Kisame soon looked over at the two Akatsuki, whom where now fast asleep. He looked at Itachi and smirked, showing a mouthful of white pointy teeth. “Seems like the nightshift is too much for them, eh Uchiha? I almost wish I could go to sleep as well… waiting so long is making me a bit drowsy.”

Itachi immediately shot him a ‘don’t you dare’ glare, causing Kisame to laugh. “I was only kidding, ya know. Where’s your sense of humor?” Itachi then grunted and turned his head, continuing to look at the large village.

Kisame sighed and played with the strap of leather that held his sword, Samehada, on his back. Kisame had came from the village hidden in the mist and had always been a little different amongst the people there. For one, he had the pure appearance of a shark. His hair and skin were blue and he even had gills, not to mention very pointy teeth. He found it difficult to live with the way he looked - especially because people would often stare and treat him differently. However, in time, he accepted his differences and decided to just live his life, despite what people might say about him.

Kisame was getting very tired, although he was trying to maintain it by putting his hands behind his head for leverage in case he unconsciously started to drift off. He looked at Itachi Uchiha once more and smiled at him. ‘His whole being is admirable,’ Kisame thought, ‘his battle style, his posture, his manners…! I better stop it or I just might get jealous of him…’
He laughed at himself and again began to watch the treetops, waving in the wind.
Itachi was standing up straight, his eyes pasted on the city below. His sharingan continued to glow crimson in the night, waiting evermore patient until they could carry on with their mission.

Itachi, like his teammate, Kisame, is also very strong. He possesses the Mangekyo Sharingan, which enables him to trap his enemies in a fake yet virtual world, in which he has total control over. The most amazing part, is that being in this world can seem like many days or even years to the enemy, although only a few seconds have passed in the real world. Along with his eye-techniques, he is amazing at genjutsu, in which he uses to create illusions to trick and confuse his opponent. Itachi can also use fire-based moves, in which he inherited from simply being a Uchiha. With all of these hands in battle, Itachi’s one person that you definitely don’t want to mess with, especially since he’s likely to have the upper hand in battle.

Itachi has also killed his entire clan, except for Sasuke Uchiha, his younger brother. He seemed to have did it out of pure leisure, not really caring whether or not his parents or relatives were reaching their deathbeds.

Although, Itachi has had it pretty rough in childhood. His Father was always pressuring him to grow stronger and stronger and to become the best in his whole clan. Naturally there wasn’t a lot of love encouraged in this atmosphere, which eventually turned Itachi into a cold person, despite his good manners. Honestly, it wouldn’t have been too hard for Itachi to kill his clan, for he was the strongest amongst them all. He also didn’t really ever establish a relationship with any one of them, which would make it easier mentally to endure it, seeing as how he never connected with anyone.

Ever since then, his younger brother had been striving to be the strongest so that he could one day revenge his clan and kill Itachi.  Itachi’s personality is still quite cold, but he also maintains a cool demeanor. Itachi is also very polite but mostly keeps to himself.

Kisame yawned and focused his gaze on Konoha. “Itachi, how long is this going to last? I’m starting to get hungry, and by just standing here, it seems like we’re getting nowhere!”

Itachi remained perfectly still, not even moving his head to look at Kisame as he said firmly, “We are to wait until we see her. Once we do, we’re going to take her and present her to Leader.”

“But why her? Misaki Hikaru isn’t even a shinobi. Why could Leader even have interest in her? She possesses no battle skills at all, and requires the shinobi of this village to defend her.” Kisame said, a little bit of annoyance in his voice.
“We are not to second-guess Leader, for he has thought every outcome out. He knows what he is doing.” Itachi said calmly and coolly.

Kisame then opened his mouth to argue but thought better of it. Itachi was right. They would all just have to bear with it and wait until this so called Misaki Hikaru showed up, no matter how hard it would be.

About an hour later, the foursome was still waiting on the tree for Misaki Hikaru to appear. Kisame was about to forget the mission and go home, But then, Kisame saw Itachi’s body suddenly tighten and instantly knew that he had spotted her. Kisame followed Itachi’s gaze until he saw a slim-looking girl with long, blonde hair walk up an alleyway in the distance.

“Wake up those two,” Itachi stated simply. “I’ll be back momentarily with her.”

Kisame nodded but then stopped short. Why did Itachi always get the cool parts of the missions? It was almost as if Itachi didn’t trust Kisame to do the dangerous, although he knew that he was just as capable as Itachi was. Or maybe it was because Itachi thought he would hurt her. Kisame had to admit that he did take the rough side of things when faced with a mission but still…

Itachi had gotten even closer to the girl, whom Itachi noticed wasn’t as completely as ugly as he thought she would be (she actually wasn’t ugly at all… but there’s Itachi for you). Her blonde hair swished right and left when she walked and Itachi could make out very pale orange highlights in it. She wore a jean skirt with brown leggings and a yellow shirt with a brown stripe going vertically across it. Her silvery eyes stayed pasted on the ground as she walked toward an unknown destination, completely unaware that Itachi was swiftly running at her, although very silently.

Itachi had a plan which would make her abduction as painless as possible, for Leader would be greatly disappointed if they had to end up hurting her in order to capture her.

He stopped a few feet in front of her, and noticed that she was wearing a small bracelet on her right hand. The beads on it were a light marigold color, and they hung on a thin string. Itachi could tell that the bracelet had been worn often. But… why did it seem so familiar? As Misaki continued to walk, she eventually bumped right into Itachi.

“Oh!” Misaki had cried, “I’m so sorr-” but that was all she said, for she had looked into his Sharingan, and was now stuck in Itachi’s virtual world.

He wouldn’t dare hurt her in the very least, and instead gave her an illusion of a green meadow with flowers and animals and large trees. Her body had started to fall backwards as her mind stayed occupied in Itachi’s virtual world, and Itachi had darted behind her to catch her before she fell.

He then scooped her up and held her in a bridal manner, carrying her to the tree. In a single jump, Itachi landed in the exact same spot he was previously standing and stood facing Kisame and company.

Deidara and Tobi were both complaining to Kisame for waking them up. “Oi, Tobi hates Kisame!” Tobi cried.

Deidara nodded in agreement. “Yeah! Why’d you hit us on the head with your sword to wake us up?! You could’ve just told us, un!”

Kisame was laughing and holding his sword in both hands. “I know, I know. But when will an opportunity like that come again? That’s why I did it!”

Itachi walked over to the trio and scowled at them. They all shrugged and apologized to one another, knowing that being in enemy territory wasn’t the best place to be arguing.

Deidara then noticed that Itachi was holding Misaki and glared at him boldly.
“So I see you’ve completed the mission without us. The Lone Uchiha as usual, eh, un?” Itachi nodded, looking down at the unconscious girl in his arms. “It seemed unnecessary to get everyone involved.”

Deidara rolled his eyes. “Oh puh-lease! C’mon Itachi! This was supposed to be a group effort. And besides, why would Leader ask all of us to come if all he needed to do the job was you?! I could’ve been in bed by now!”

Kisame looked at Deidara, pitying him a bit, and then he drew his sword back without anyone noticing, and clonked him on the back of the head.

“Aaarggghh!” Deidara cried, jumping up and down in pain. “Why’d you do that for?”

Kisame snickered yet again then straightened his face. “Because your mouth is getting annoying.”

Deidara felt a fire light inside of him and he started yelling at the top of his lungs, “GOD, KISAME! I HATE YOU, YA KNOW THAT?!  YOU’RE SUCH A FOOL, UN!!!”

Kisame was obviously enjoying this a lot, and kept laughing and laughing at him, which in turn only made Deidara even angrier. Tobi had walked over to where Itachi was and stood behind him, trying to avoid the argument that was taking place.

Itachi sighed and looked back at Tobi.

“Do you want to leave?” Tobi nodded, and then in an instant, the two disappeared. When Kisame turned around to look at Itachi and Tobi, noticing that they had disappeared he stood there confused.

“They left…” He murmured under his breath. Deidara, whom was still yelling restlessly looked over to see that Itachi and Tobi were truly gone.

He stopped his racket and cleared his throat. “They…did?” He asked rather quietly.

Kisame nodded, still looking at where Itachi and Tobi once stood.

“Well, it doesn’t surprise me. If you wouldn’t have hit me on the head, this would’ve never happened!”

Kisame looked over at Deidara and frowned deeply at him. He sighed. “Fine. I’m sorry, okay?”

Deidara squinted at him, not fully convinced. “Really…?” Kisame nodded.

Deidara grunted and then said through a yawn, “Well, I’m ready for bed. Let’s leave, un.”

“Yeah.”

And in an instant, the two disappeared, leaving nothing but their scent behind.