Guns and Roses Chapter 4

The two Akatsuki members traveled along a busy sidewalk, heads down with no desire to speak a word to each other. Sasori was boiling mad, and Deidara was sulking like a child. The two had left before the sun had even risen so that they could beat the morning commuters. Only a few people were out walking at the ungodly hour of five in the morning, making it rather easy for the duo to get around. It was only three miles until they hit the outskirts of the city, and another mile until they reached the spot where Itachi had spotted the first of many Oto members. Although it was quiet a distance from the Akatsuki base, it was still close enough to be dangerous.

As the two traveled, an uncomfortable silence loomed over them. Sasori seemed not to notice, but every once in a while his partner would fidget or walk just a little bit differently to make some noise. It was subtle enough that the redhead didn't notice, but enough to keep Deidara sane for a little bit longer. To try and pass the time, Deidara slipped a cigarette out of his pocket and lit it, relishing the feeling he got upon his first inhale of smoke. Out of all the things he lived for, this was one of them.

But as he smoked away his cigarette, there was still an eerie lack of noise. He wanted to say something, but what? There was no doubt Sasori would snap at him; it was his fault that they were stuck with this assignment in the first place. Since they had been dismissed from Pein's office the previous day, they had been on even worse terms than before.

“This is the second time we've been sent out to get information about Oto, un,” Deidara stated, unable to deal with it any longer. Go ahead, let his partner yell at him. That was the worst he could do, wasn't it? There's no way he'd cause a scene in the middle of the city. Especially at this hour. The last thing they needed was someone calling the police on them for unnecessary noise.

“Yes.”

The silence settled in on them again. “Why?”

“They're dangerous.”

“They can't be that bad. I've never heard of them, un.”

“That's because they don't waste their time with fools, brat.”

“Seriously, Sasori. What's so important about them, un?” Deidara asked, too tired to get into a spat. All he wanted was to curl up in bed...or get some breakfast. Either or would have been lovely. After eating barely enough to keep himself running for the past few days, hunger was beginning to hit him. Hard.

“They're not exactly thrilled with us.”

“So, un?”

“Brat, they are one of the most powerful gangs in this entire country. We've rubbed each other the wrong way more than once, and now they're planning something big. For the past few months they've been getting closer to us. Little by little, so we don't notice. We're trying to hit them before they can hit us.”

“...Oh, un,” Deidara said. He had nothing else to add, and just settled on walking along with his eyes drooping every once in a while. Whenever he began to slow down, he woke himself up for fear of Sasori yelling at him. It wasn't the fact that Sasori was constantly rude. No, it was that Deidara knew he would react. He just couldn't help himself. Sudden waves of anger would come over him, and release no matter how hard the blond tried to contain them.

“The first sighting that Itachi noted was the river just outside of the city. As of right now, we have about two miles before we get there. I'll have to keep myself out of sight, since Orochimaru knows exactly what I look like. You, on the other hand, will be looking for anything that you can find that might be of use to us.”

“Okay, un.” He had done this on his own dozens of times. And the fact that they had no idea what he looked like? That was going to make the whole thing a breeze. As always, he still brought his weapons as a precaution. You never knew when you'd need to blast someone's brains out.

~~

At around six o clock, they had reached the outskirts of the city where the river began to shrink itself down. It tricked down the side of a main road before making a sharp turn into a small settlement of trees. There was very little grass on the ground; it had to have been used as a running trail recently.

“I'm going to ditch, un.”

“I have my phone on me. Let me know if you do something stupid.”

“Piss off, un.”

With that, Deidara separated himself from the redhead, strolling around to get a good look at his surroundings. There was no real dead end, making every direction a reasonable escape route. Besides the running trail, the area looked like it had never been occupied.

Deidara had been in the criminal business long enough to know that there was something up. The more subtle it was, the more likely he was to dig something up. The thing is, he had to go into this mission looking for something. What it was didn't really matter. But he needed to keep his eyes peeled for anything unusual. After six years of this shit, it wasn't that hard to do. It was like his brain began functioning in a completely different manner. He was almost separated from himself. There was only the job in front of him, nothing else.

There was no sign that they had dug any holes into the ground, but there were certainly plenty of trees around. The poor things already looked like their lives were winding down, so it wouldn't be too noticeable if Oto made a few compartments to store their shit in.

With that in mind, Deidara began his search. He weaved in and out of different paths, looking wherever he could. There were a few slips of paper here and there, scrawled with handwriting so messy he could hardly read what was being said. Nonetheless, he took pictures of each item before slipping them into his pocket.

After fifteen minutes of searching, his stomach began to grumble. Great. He really should have gotten some breakfast before he left. Sighing heavily, Deidara leaned against a nearby tree, pushing onto it with his full weight. Had he noticed the cracking coming from the tree, he probably would have moved before his elbow busted clean through it. He let out a cry, immediately pulling himself away. Wait... Rushing back to the tree, Deidara stuck his face as far as he could into the hole. Damn it, it was too dark to see anything. With a scowl, he plunged his hand into the hole, a smile breaking across his face when he felt plastic. He pulled out everything he could, finding everything from unlabeled bagged items, to numerous unlabeled files. This had to be important. Why the hell else would it be here? Trying to keep himself composed, Deidara snapped pictures of everything he found and stuffed it all into the backpack he had brought with him, looking around as he did to make sure no one was there.

As he was busy zipping up his bag, he heard his phone buzz in his pocket. Immediately, the blond whipped it out of his pocket. The only one that would try to contact him at this hour would have been Sasori. Sure enough, it was.

Some guy's been on my tail for a while. See if you can get him. I'm near the clearing. Deidara read the text and sighed. This wasn't going to be good. There was never just one of them out there. He had found what he needed, so heading back to Sasori probably wasn't that bad of an idea. That way, at least they could take out everyone they needed to at once. If he was lucky, maybe he could snipe the stalker following the redhead on his way back. He didn't dare pull out his phone again. All of the information he needed was on there. He also stuffed whatever he could in his pockets. Sure, they were going to know that Akatsuki was there, but if they were already on Sasori's tail, it wasn't going to make much of a difference either way.

Right now, Sasori was an ally. Despite the fact that he had been forced into the Akatsuki and the redhead had been absolutely horrendous to him, work was more important. Oto sounded more dangerous than anything Akatsuki could muster up and quite frankly, he was curious. He walked as casually as he could back to the forest clearing, getting close enough so that he could see Sasori walking aimlessly around the area. It was just like he had come there for a walk before work. Unfortunately, the gang knew his face too well.

Deidara glanced around as casually as he could, and caught sight of a man only a few meters away from his partner, gun in hand. The kid was shaking; obviously he was new to the workings of these organizations.

“Hey, un!” Deidara shouted, loudly enough for the kid to accidentally fire the gun straight up into the air. Sasori whipped around, grabbing his own weapon. Before the kid could pull himself together, Deidara managed to get to Sasori's side, hand on his back pocket. The gun was already cocked, but he wasn't sure if he'd need it; the kid hardly looked like a criminal.

Then again, that was how Deidara had gotten himself by for so many years.

“Get out here,” Sasori growled, so forceful that the boy had been scared into revealing himself. The boy was pointing his gun straight at Sasori, and just from the angle Deidara could tell that if he actually fired it, it would hit Sasori straight in the heart. Their enemy most likely was not aware of this. He looked white as a sheet, unable to do anything but stand and shake in front of his opponents.

“Orochimaru must have sent you out as a scout, yeah?” Sasori inquired, finger right over the trigger of his gun. One wrong move and the kid was done. When he got no answer, Sasori fired, letting the bullet whiz right past his enemy's head. At this, the child nearly fainted. “Answer me.”

“Y-yes...”

Great, this wasn't going to get them anywhere. “You don't look like a criminal, un,” Deidara commented, completely changing the subject. He knew calming this poor fool down would get them a little further. “Could you see yourself killing this man? He has so much ahead of him...an entire life to live. Are you willing to be responsible for taking that way, un?”

“I...I have to!”

“Why, un?”

Their opponent shifted his weight from foot to foot, not taking an eye off of Sasori. “You're from Akatsuki.”

Sasori scowled, baring his teeth at the boy. “Fuck this shit,” he growled, moving to point his gun at the boy's head. The next thing he knew, there were two shots and a blood curdling shriek. He could see the boy fall to the ground, a shocked expression on his face. Blood had began to drip from his mouth and nose, indicating that he had been shot.

“Christ, what the hell, Sasori, un?” Deidara screamed, using his gun to try and bash his partner over the head. His other hand was dangling at his side, but the redhead paid it no mind. Rather, he was more interested in defending himself from his enraged comrade. “Goddamn it, I was handling it fine, un! What made you think it would be a good idea to butt in!?”

At this, Sasori scoffed. “Handling it? You weren't going to get yourself anywhere! That kid was a brainwashed thug!”

“You fired at him first, un!” Deidara shrieked, managing to successfully hit Sasori in the face with the butt of his gun. “I can't believe you, un!”

By now, Sasori had lost interest in Deidara's verbal attacks. He had dodged several more swings from the blond, mind turning to try and find an answer to a pretty serious question. “Deidara?”

“What, un?!” said blond spat, taking another swing at Sasori's head. This time, the redhead managed to catch it and pry the gun from his partner's hand. There was still the chance of getting hit, but it wouldn't be nearly as painful this time.

“Where did the second bullet go?”

At this, Deidara had to stop for a second and think. He had ceased his attacks, and was now looking around. “Must have missed.”

“Why do I not believe you?”

“Did you get shot, un?”

“...No.”

“Then it missed, un,” Deidara snapped, storming by the redhead. “I'm stopping at a pastry shop. I want breakfast.”

Sasori managed to scramble to his feet and catch up to the blond. “Brat, you don't have any money.”

“You're paying for me, un.”

“Why?”

“Because you just fucked this up! God, after how much you talked about me screwing this up, you've really got to be kidding me, Sasori, un.” Sensing another outburst, the redhead decided to shut his mouth and let it slide. Looks like he was getting the both of them breakfast.

~~

It wasn't until they were nearing the shop that Sasori noticed something was wrong. Every once in a while, Deidara would wince. When asked about it, the blond would give a vicious reply, seemingly ready to tear his partner apart. That being said, Sasori wasn't ready to drop it. He waited until he sat down and had the blond cornered to speak again.

“What's wrong?”

“Nothing, un.” Oh, great, the kid was starting to act like a teenage girl. It didn't help that he looked like one, too.

“Brat, I'm not stupid.”

“I'll take care of it when we get back to the base, un.”

“Take care of what?”

Rolling his eyes as if he already told Sasori, the blond jerked his left hand out of his pocket and held it up for his partner to see. In the center of his palm, the skin had been pierced, and blood was practically pouring out of the wound. Squinting at it, Sasori could see that a bullet had smashed its way into several of the bones in Deidara's hand. “What the hell!” Sasori hissed, grabbing the blond's hand and yanking it closer. “Did you shoot yourself?!” That was the only reasonable explanation he could think of.

“I am an expert in firearms. What makes you think I'm careless enough to shoot myself, un?” Deidara retorted, wincing slightly as Sasori began to move his hand. “Watch it, un.”

There were several things the redhead could have said in reply, but he held his tongue. Now was not the time to start a spat. “When did this happen?” Sasori asked as calmly as he could. Several of the bones were shattered. There was no way they'd be able to go to a hospital, so they'd have to wait until he got back to headquarters to have the wound treated. Hopefully, the bones wouldn't start to heal themselves by then.

“When that moron fired off his gun.”

“The first time?”

“No, the second, un.”

“You said it missed!”

Deidara blinked once, then twice. “...Yeah, un. It did.”

“Are you stupid? That didn't miss!”

“It missed you. I caught it before it got you right through the chest. You would have been dead as a doornail, un.”

Sasori opened his mouth to speak, but words refused to come out. He...caught it? There was no way that blond moron would have been able to see the bullet, never mind catch it in mid air. “Are you kidding me?”

“Does it look like I'm kidding you?”

“Forget about breakfast. We need to get back to headquarters. Now.”