Well then. Hai gaiz, long time no post XD

(Thanks for all the support, everyone, ILU muchly.)

Originally i had three chapters planned for this story, but I woke up this morning with THIS in my head so um.

Here we go. Chapter Extra.

-RainbowDoom

Itachi Uchiha was knitting.

It was early morning, the next day. No one had felt like cleaning up the living room when they all went to bed at two in the morning, but they had managed to haul Itachi out of the mountain of confetti.

And now he was making use of his brand-new birthday present: besides being a fitting way to pass the time for the formidable mass-murderer, it was also said to improve hand-eye coordination, which was an added bonus.

So there he was in the corner of the living room, quietly rocking back and forth in his personalized rocking chair as he knitted. Several balls of brightly colored yarn were nestled in a basket beside him. Contributing to the cozy scene was Tobi, lying on the rug by Itachi's feet, making paper cutouts.

Itachi's knit creation, unfortunately – and this may have had something to do with the Uchiha's ever-worsening eyesight – was a multicolored sock/scarf hybrid which began upstairs in Itachi's bedroom, winding its way down two flights of stairs and through a tangle of table and chair legs all the way to where it ended at Itachi's rocking chair.

Pein would find a use for it. He always did.

"Itachi-san," Tobi piped up suddenly, delicately snipping the corner off of a piece of paper with a pair of safety scissors. "What are you making? I really like it. Tobi is making a gift for Senpai. You can't tell him, though. It's a surprise. Who is that going to be for, Itachi-san?"

In these situations, as Deidara had yet to learn, you had to let Tobi do the talking.

The "good boy" picked up both ends of his scrap of paper and tugged, unfolding a chain of paper doll cutouts wearing black cloaks with red clouds.

"It's a decoration, see?"

Something of a smile crossed Itachi's face. He set down his creation and selected a ball of cheerful orange yarn.

Deidara was in a black void. He was running from something, but he didn't know what it was. The faster he tried to run, the more it seemed like he wasn't getting anywhere.

Deidara looked back over his shoulder and the thing he was running from came into view. It was Tobi, an immense Tobi, taller than any building he had ever seen, taller than the sky, getting closer every second. Deidara could hardly breathe now. And in front of him, twin sharingans revolved, looming closer and closer, closing in, and he was surrounded–

Deidara woke up, finding that he was choking on his pillow.

He yawned. Tobi was already gone, as he was most mornings. However, today there was a chain of nine paper cutouts taped to the wall above Deidara's bed. Upon closer inspection, he found that it depicted the Akatsuki – one cutout had plantlike appendages, another had a ponytail.

Speaking of which.

Deidara tied up his hair, simultaneously attempting to make his bed, but ended up wishing he had left the bed alone because it had looked better in the first place. Then he left the room in search of breakfast.

When Deidara arrived in the kitchen, sort of mostly awake and yawning, Kakuzu was already at the table, running a pen down a page of figures in his infamous little black checkbook. Deidara reached, zombielike, for a bowl, just as Zetsu made his usual entrance up through the kitchen floor.

Deidara opened the refrigerator, quickly finding what appeared to be the least stale bottle of milk, and began to pour this into his cereal bowl.

He frowned, wondering why his feet were suddenly wet. Then he realized that there was a gaping hole in the cereal bowl… the vivid orange, oval-shaped cereal bowl, grooved on the bottom… wait a second…

Holy shit.

Deidara dropped Tobi's mask onto the table as if it had given him an electric shock, his mind working furiously.

Tobi's mask… Tobi's mask… Tobi… Tobi's not wearing his mask!

And in the midst of these muddled, half-formed thoughts, one single objective pulsed brightly:

I've got to find him.

Deidara stuffed Tobi's mask into his cloak pocket and made a beeline for the staircase. Up the stairs he sprinted, burning with crazed energy, leaving behind an indifferent Kakuzu and a completely mystified Zetsu.

First stop: the bathroom. It was a possibility. It was disgusting. But it was still a possibility.

Deidara skidded into the bathroom and happened to glance into the bathtub, in which a copious quantity of green jell-o was bubbling ominously.

"Er," said Deidara, not to anyone in particular. "Right then. Un."

Next stop, Hidan and Kakuzu.

Halfway to Hidan and Kakuzu's room, Deidara found himself quite suddenly sprawled on the floor. He winced, and, picking himself up, noticed the thirty-foot-long thing he had tripped over.

It was purple. And it was yellow. And red. And blue. And green. And orange. And purple again. But what was it?

Deidara held it close to his face.

It was knitted out of yarn. Itachi's, no doubt. The Uchiha must be making good use of his birthday present – or something. Deidara scrambled up and let go of Itachi's knitting.

On to Hidan and Kakuzu's. Deidara burst through the door and looked around frantically. Hidan was nowhere to be seen, but Deidara heard the shower going in the attached bathroom. He walked across the bedroom, carefully avoiding the puddles of blood, and entered the bathroom beyond.

It was like walking into a sauna. Deidara staggered, inhaling the boiling 100% humidity. "Agh," he choked. "Hidan, how can you breathe in this?"

"Blondie!" Hidan howled, clutching the shower curtain to his chest. "What the hell are you doing in here?"

Deidara ducked to avoid the sudden onslaught of kunai and bars of soap (which had been exceptionally hard to detect through the steam) and replied, "Tobi's missing his mask, un."

"His mask? But Tobi–"

"I've been trying to find him," Deidara said. "Where did you see Tobi last?"

"When he dumped all that confetti on Itachi's head last night," Hidan replied. "Haven't you checked his room?"

"No!" Deidara exclaimed, snapping his fingers. "I'll bet that's where he is– Thanks, Hidan," he called, walking out of the bathroom. There was a distant "whoops!" and a splat as the rock-nin slipped in a puddle of blood outside the door.

Covered in blood from who-knows-where and panting slightly, Deidara skidded into his and Tobi's room, only to find it empty. He sighed. Now that he thought about it, he hadn't seen Tobi or Itachi since last night's hot pepper incident… this was beginning to develop into a rather perplexing state of affairs.

In the meantime, however, here he was, at another dead end, with no new leads. What now?

Deidara had never really paid Tobi's side of the room much attention before. It was less cluttered than Deidara's side, for one thing, and way more… sparkly. He carefully avoided eye contact with the large, garish unicorn poster pasted to the wall and examined the bedside table with mild interest.

A hand-picked bouquet of dandelions. A bottle of black nail polish (so that's where that went, thought Deidara). A crayoned picture of Tobi and his Senpai atop a bird (Deidara cringed).

Aha. Tobi's diary.

Deidara snatched it eagerly, then hesitated, biting his lip. Was this really such a good idea?

He opened it up and began to read.

Approximately thirty seconds later, he set the diary down, appalled.

He wasn't sure which was more disturbing: the sorts of things that Tobi wrote about, or the atrociously cheerful tone in which he wrote about them.

He was just wondering which room to check next when he heard a sudden snatch of voices farther down the hallway. Deidara froze. Then he whirled around and crept to the doorway, peering down the hall.

There was Tobi. Masked. Walking alongside Itachi, who was squinting down at his knitting. It trailed eight feet behind him as he walked.

Deidara blinked, bewildered. What…

"…it's a really cool mask, Itachi-san. Much more comfortable than the old one. I really like it."

"Mm," Itachi replied, tripping over his knitting and landing on his face. He stood up as if this had not just happened and continued walking.

Deidara frantically checked his cloak pocket to make sure that Tobi's mask was still in there. He pulled it out and held on with both hands. He looked up – Tobi had his mask on, just like always.

Wait a second…

As the two Akatsuki members approached Deidara, he saw Tobi's mask clearly. It wasn't… quite right. It looked distinctly fuzzy.

Then he understood. He blinked. He groaned. He let Tobi's real mask slip through his fingers and fell to the ground after it.

"Deidara-senpai!" Tobi shouted, noticing Deidara at last as he hit the floor. Tobi sprinted down the hall towards his partner and knelt down beside him. "Deidara-senpai, what is it? …Oh, you found my old mask. Don't you like this one better? Tobi really does."

It was knitted.

That damned Uchiha knit Tobi a new mask out of orange yarn.

Damn it.

Deidara fumed. "It's lovely, Tobi, un," he said, with much grinding of teeth. Then a new pair of feet arrived – complete with purple nail polish.

Deidara jumped up, fists clenched and teeth (all sets) bared. Itachi continued to knit, his knitting needles slightly blurred as they clicked together with steadily increasing speed. Tobi, noticing the danger signs, gave a quick "See you later, Senpai," and sprinted down the stairs.

No one spoke for quite a long while. Deidara broke the silence.

"Itachi… why the hell did you do that?"

The Uchiha calmly looked up from his knitting. "To test my abilities. If you wish to kill me one day, foster your hatred and–"

Deidara twitched.

"I felt it necessary," Itachi said with a slight smile. And it was quite worth it to see you dashing around the house like a lunatic.

It only made sense that a person who was strangely detached and emotionless ninety-eight percent of the year would have to compensate somehow. So it was on this day that Itachi Uchiha completely lost it.

The stars were just beginning to emerge and Itachi's curtains were drawn. He was in his second-floor bedroom, sitting cross-legged on his bed, his cloak spread out behind him across the comforter as he reflected upon the last few days, two events in particular

Deidara was such an unfortunate person; it was really quite sad. That was twice that Itachi had gotten the better of him – Tobi's new mask, and the hot pepper incident. Hmm.

And then, in his mind's eye, Itachi again saw the look on Deidara's face when he had seen Tobi's orange knitted mask, and the moment when the rock-nin realized that he had eaten that fiery pepper.

Itachi suppressed a chortle. Quite sad? Rather amusing, more like. Itachi bit his lip, trying not to smile. He had looked all so ridiculously deranged, and so… funny.

Another snatch of laughter. (They were happening at increasingly frequent intervals now.) And then, all at once, the Uchiha exploded.

Itachi fell back against the wall in a nonstop state of laughter. He gasped, scarlet eyes streaming, pounding the comforter with his fist. Then he flopped down, landing lengthwise on the bed, still cackling like a lunatic. His head hit his pillow, ponytail untidy, headband askew, shaking with uncontrollable sobs of mirth.

That was how Kisame found him.

The mist-nin was on his way upstairs from the kitchen, having just polished off the very last carton of ice cream in the freezer (it hadn't been that great anyway; it had been in there for at least two years and was suffering from a severe case of freezer-burn). He rounded the corner up the stairs and started down the hall. Strange noises seemed to be coming from his and Itachi's shared room.

He opened the door – and stared.

There was Itachi, apparently in hysterics, sobbing into his pillow. Was he laughing? Crying?

Apparently both. Itachi sat up with difficulty, the fits of laughter continuing. He noticed Kisame, who was mouthing wordlessly from the doorway, frozen in place. The laughter began to diminish.

Kisame managed to speak then.

"Itachi… I… did that just…?" he rasped.

"Yes, that just happened," said Itachi evenly as he straightened his forehead protector. Kisame's eyebrows shot up.

"But if you tell anyone," the Uchiha said, "I'm denying it completely."

That's all ;) Hope you enjoyed :D