Maru rolled around in his bed restlessly, trying to succumb to sleep and failing. There was an uncomfortable draft in the late puppet's room and his too-big-for-an-eight-year-old clothes didn't help that situation any. For some reason he began to think of how he'd prefer to once again be in the same bed as Deidara, the blonde's body heat warming him. Then the redhead chuckled to the darkness as a thought struck him. I wonder if 'Tobi' ended up sleeping with Danna, too.

A smile graced his lips as he turned onto his side, finally falling into the blissful abyss that is sleep.

--In another room--

Hidan stared blankly at Itachi. "So . . . you think that Maru is Sasori." He stated dryly.

"Yes." Itachi confirmed, nodding his head.

"How the fuck is that possible?"

The Uchiha didn't have much of a defense in mind, so he simply shrugged. "I don't know," he admitted. "But what I do know is that he does look strikingly similar to Sasori, correct?"

Hidan slowly nodded his head. "Yeah, but so what? Deidara looks a hell of a lot like this one bitch in Konohagakure, but they're not the same fucking person, are they? No. They're not."

Itachi chose to ignore the Jashinist's snide comment. "And," he continued. "He wasn't at all freaked out by your 'ritual.' When I asked him about it later he said 'It was kinda like I've already seen that somewhere before. Y'know, like déjà vu.' Déjà vu, Hidan! Sasori had plenty of time to get used to your bloody religion!"

"Sure," Hidan snorted. "When he was fucking alive."

Still ignoring him Itachi said, "Plus you should've seen the way he looked at those puppets! It was like they were the most beautiful things that he'd ever seen! He used that exact word, by the way; 'beautiful.' And when he found the ones with weapons he had gotten this glint in his eye. You know where else I've seen that glint before, Hidan?"

The addressed rolled his eyes. "Lemme guess, Sasori?" Itachi nodded, causing Hidan to let out a frustrated sigh. "Look, Itachi, I see the resemblance and all, but there is no fucking way that Maru could be Sasori reincarnated. It's just fucking impossible!"

Itachi raised an eyebrow. "Does the Jashin religion have no history of reincarnates? None?"

Hidan swore under his breath; the Uchiha had him there. "Dammit, how'd you know?"

Itachi simply gave him a knowing smirk, completely succeeding in pissing Hidan off.

Said Jashinist leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms in a huff. "Okay, let's say, hypothetically, Maru could be Sasori reincarnated. There's still no fucking way that he is!

Itachi mimicked Hidan's posture. "And why not?"

"Because Maru acts nothing like Sasori! That red headed fucker would always go around and be all emotionless and crap and get pissed off by the most retarded things! Maru's nothing like that! He actually shows some respect for Deidara, unlike that damned puppet." Hidan calmed down a bit and downcast his eyes. "I dunno . . . Maru just seems too . . . too human to be Sasori."

"Well," Itachi said matter-of-factly. "When Sasori was alive he was a wooden puppet. Reincarnated he's just a regular human like he was before the transformation."

" . . . Why tell your theory to me, anyways?" Hidan asked finally, purposely avoiding Itachi's observation.

"Because," Itachi said softly. "You seem to be the only other person concerned about Deidara's emotional stability around here."

Hidan's body stiffened visibly. And here I thought that I was cleverly hiding my concern. "What's that have to do with Maru being Sasori?"

Itachi raised both of his eyebrows in amusement. "So you agree?" Hidan grunted in response, earning a broad, triumphant grin from the Uchiha before he answered Hidan's question. "Well, I think that the reason Sasori was reincarnated in the first place has something to do with Deidara."

Violet eyes stared blankly at black ones. "You lost me."

The sharingan wielder let out an impatient sigh. "It was no coincidence that Maru got put in Deidara's care. It's obvious that whoever is running things here on Earth wanted them to be together."

Hidan stared at Itachi even more, although it was more of a bewildered stare this time. "You mean . . . you think that they're meant to . . . be together as in . . . like . . . a . . . a . . . a couple?"

Itachi shrugged nonchalantly. "Well, yeah. And I think that since Sasori didn't realize that when he was alive, They gave him a second chance."

"As a fucking eight year old." Hidan said, returning to his dry tone.

Itachi rubbed the back of his head and if Hidan hadn't known him better then the Jashinist would've sworn that the Uchiha was embarrassed. "Actually . . . I haven't really figured out the age thing yet. But it could be just because They didn't want anyone to recognize him."

"Who is this 'they' that you keep fucking mentioning?"

Itachi shrugged. "Angels? God? I don't know."

Hidan pressed his lips into a straight line, mulling this over in his head. "Well Itachi, I hate to admit this, but I think you're right."

Itachi smiled at the acknowledgement of his genius, but that quickly faded when Hidan asked him a question that he had not anticipated.

"So if the reason why Maru, Sasori, is here is because he didn't realize his . . . love . . . for Deidara what happens when he realizes that now? Does he continue living the rest of his life? Does he turn back into his pre-dead, twenty-something year old puppet self? Or does he, like, fucking die or some shit like that?"

Itachi frowned, wrinkles forming on his forehead. "I . . . I don't know, Hidan."

The two S-ranked criminals both stayed silent as a fear of the super-natural and the unknown settled into the dimly lit room.

--Deidara's PoV--

Dammit. That stupid idiot bothered the shit out of me all day and now, when it's night and I'm trying to sleep, he talks in his fucking sleep! That's just great, un.

I was regretting allowing Tobi to sleep with me in my bed and I was even beginning to think that I should've made him sleep out in the hallway.

"Bastard." I grumbled as I shoved my blanket off of me and rolled off of the bed. There was no way that I was going to get any sleep with that orange-masked idiot babbling only inches away.

Without thinking about it I found myself standing in front of Sasori no Danna's old bedroom- Maru's new one. It was a logical place to end up, considering that I used to go to Danna's room all the time when I couldn't get to sleep. He was always awake, sitting at a desk and working on one of his puppets. That is, except for one time when I had caught him with a lump of clay . . .

(flashback time! ;D)

I knocked on the perfectly polished wood and listened to the solid sound that it made. I waited a total of two minutes in silence before I decided that Danna wasn't going to answer.

What can he be doing? I know he's not asleep, un. I mean, he can't. Puppets don't sleep.

I quietly opened the door a few centimeters, and then all the way when I saw what Sasori was doing.

"Danna!" I exclaimed, surprised.

Sasori's head snapped up and he whirled around to look at me, hiding something behind his back. "Brat! What are you doing here? Haven't I told you before not to just barge in?"

I took a step back nervously. "I, um, I knocked, un."

Danna narrowed his eyes at me. "So what do you want?"

I fidgeted a little under his gaze. I hated when he got like this. "I . . . I couldn't get to sleep, un . . ."

His glare just intensified. "So why come to me, hmm?"

I looked down at the space between my feet. Danna normally wasn't so snappish when I came during the night. Usually he would just let me sit on his bed and watch him work until I fell asleep as long as I didn't make any noise. "I . . . I-"

Danna snorted. "Just leave, brat. Now."

I was just about to do as he said when I remembered what I thought I had seen him working on. "Hey, Danna, un, were you just working with clay?"

His muddy eyes widened. "N-No! What would give you that ridiculous idea? Clay is a waste of space, subject to change just like everything else that isn't my art."

I grinned at his obvious denial. "Curious as to what I like about, eh?"

Sasori glared at me for a moment before sighing in defeat and turning around to face the clay. "Fine. You caught me. I was trying to make something out of your stupid clay, but it's just too damn hard!"

I laughed when I saw the oddly misshapen attempt at a person sitting on the desk at the far end of the room. I walked over beside Danna and placed my hands on his to show him how to mold the clay. "You were going about it all wrong. You do it like this, un . . ."

I chuckled fondly at the memory before I realized that I was still standing in a hallway in front of my dead partner's room at one in the morning. I instinctively reached for the door but then hesitated.

I mean, what could I possibly want to do in there? Maru was most likely already asleep and even if he wasn't I couldn't just waltz in there and ask to sleep with him because my own room had become too noisy for my liking. That would just be stupid.

But at the same time I couldn't go back to my room. That would be suicide.

I let out a long yawn as I slowly slid to the floor. Wow, I guess I'm more tired than I thought. Maybe . . . maybe I could just sleep out here in the hallway. That doesn't . . . seem like such a . . . a bad . . . idea.

My incoherent thoughts became a jumbled mess as I succumbed to sleep just outside of Danna's old bedroom, snoring slightly.

--

A/N: So what do you think of Itachi's theory? Very clever, neh? Well, he is an Uchiha. So review and tell me what you think, 'kay? Oh, and next chapter I'm either going to have Deidara visit the place where Sasori died or have Maru go through Sasori's stuff and find a journal or something . . . or perhaps a mixture of the two.