February: End (Part 3)

The shows are over for the night. The performers are gathered together in the dressing room, getting ready to leave.

Pein, jacket on and keys in hand, claps for their attention. "Gentlemen, we have a little problem." The performers drop what they are doing, and pay attention to Pein.

Pein looks at Zetsu.

Zetsu grins, and announces, "I got a date."

Pein sighs. "You see? We've got no one to clean up the theatre tonight, because Zetsu's busy. One or two of you are going to have to stay back and clean up instead. Whoever does will get a little bonus when we divide the money on Friday."

Pein looks expectantly at Kakuzu, who is practically drooling at the thought of extra money. However, Hidan ruins Kakuzu's chance of getting the money by grabbing his arm and pulling him out the door. "We're not doing any fucking cleaning. Seeya tomorrow, assholes!" he shouts over his shoulder.

Pein sighs again and shakes his head. He looks next at Itachi and Kisame. Itachi speaks up, saying, "I'm busy, and so is Kisame." Kisame grins and nods agreement.

"Fine. See you tomorrow," says Pein. As Itachi and Kisame leave, he turns his gaze onto Sasori and Deidara, saying simply, "You two?"

"Sure, we'll do it, un," says Deidara.

Pein looks at Sasori.

Sasori nods in agreement.

Pein throws the keys to the back door to Sasori, saying, "Lock up when you're done, ok?" He exits the theater, with Konan following behind.

Wordless, Sasori and Deidara pull brooms from a little closet backstage. They descend the steps from the stage and slip between the dark, empty seats where the audience had sat just a few minutes before. They begin to sweep up the dust.

After a few minutes, Deidara notices that there is much more dust than he had ever expected one night's show would bring in. He leans his broom against a seat and goes to empty his dustpan into a nearby trash can. As he comes back, he stares defiantly at Sasori, who is standing in one of the aisles watching him. "Aren't you going to sweep, un?" he asks.

Sasori shrugs and pretends to sweep the aisle, not remembering that Deidara has already swept it. "I don't like this kind of thing," he says quietly. "You're the clean one."

"Yeah, and you're the bastard slob," says Deidara, beginning to sweep.

Sasori frowns. "From 'Danna' to 'Bastard', huh? What are you going to call me next, 'Fag'?"

Deidara looks up at him, sneering. "Yeah, fag."

Sasori feels his temper creeping up on him. He pushes it down, and says, "Haven't you had enough revenge already? Look, I know you're angry, and I can understand why. I know what I said earlier was too harsh. Let it go."

Deidara stops sweeping and faces Sasori. "Are you trying to say sorry, un? Yeah, don't give me that crap. You're a bastard and a fag, and you know what? I hope someone rapes you, un."

Dei gets ready for Sasori to lunge at him and beat him to a pulp, but to his surprise, Sasori seems to shrink into his jacket. In the semi-darkness he looks older, almost his true age.

"You think I hate you, right?" Sasori says.

Dei feels taken aback. "You do hate me, Danna," he says loudly.

"You're wrong," Sasori says.

"What do you mean?" says Deidara, not hiding his confusion.

Sasori lifts his head and looks right into Deidara's eyes. The shadows projecting across his face strengthen his gaze, so Deidara can't look away. His mouth opens, and a series of quiet, arrow-like words slip out between his lips. "I love you, Brat," he says. "You won't believe me ever, but I do."

Deidara's mouth falls open in shock. "You what!"

"I love you," Sasori repeats. "Don't make me say it again."

"Well you have a funny way of showing it, un!" exclaims Deidara.

"You don't believe me," says Sasori, reading his face.

"Of course, I don't."

Sasori half-smiles. "Until today, I wouldn't have believed it myself either," he says. "But it's true."

Deidara stands there in shocked silence as Sasori stands up, and walks towards him.

He draws up close to Deidara, and raises his heels off the ground a few inches so his lips can meet Dei's. He kisses him once quickly, and then turns away. "Where's that damn old hag," he mutters. "She should be here already."

Deidara doesn't hear him muttering. He's transfixed, just staring at him, mouth agape. His skin tingles, and his heart beats so fast he's afraid it will beat its way right out of his chest. Time slows down to a snail's pace. His body acts before he knows what to do. He steps forward, the muscles in his right arm tightening and his hand closing into a fist. He sees Sasori turn towards him. He pulls his right arm back to strike.

Then, something goes wrong. His hand opens and reaches out forwards, along with his left, and his arms wrap around Sasori and pull him close. He hears Sasori's sharp intake of breath, and, a second later, feels his arms around him.

Time slows down completely, and stops. They stand there, with their arms around each other. No words. No thoughts. Just the warm pressure of two bodies pressed against each other.

"Hey, Kid! Is that you down there in the dark?"

Sasori and Deidara jump apart and their heads whip around to look at the old woman standing onstage.

"Yes," answers Sasori. "You're late."

"Well, aren't you a little ray of sunshine?" she shouted over her shoulder, walking off stage. "Come on. Let's get this over with, Kid."

Sasori sighs. For once, he doesn't really feel like practicing with his puppets. He walks down the aisle, up the stairs to the stage, and around the side of the curtain to the wings. He pulls the puppet Day off his rack, and carries her up the small spiral staircase to the platform hanging over the stage.

Taking his place next to Chiyo, he lets Day down to the stage carefully. She's only a little more than four feet tall and very light. He hangs her from one of the hooks on the platform's railing, and goes back down offstage. Picking up a blunt metal sword, he walks onstage and curls her fingers around its hilt. Using a small screwdriver, he tightens the screws in her fingers so that they hold their position. He goes back up to the platform, and unhooks her crossbar.

Turning to Chiyo, he asks, "You're ready?"

She cackles and says, "I've been ready for a while, kid. You going to open the curtain?"

Sasori frowns. "Deidara!" he yells. "Can you open the curtain for us?"

Dei doesn't reply, but Sasori sees him come in around the edge of the curtain and go into the part of the wings where the stage mechanism is. In quick jerks, the curtain opens in front of Sasori, exposing the empty chairs of the audience.

The two puppeteers begin to maneuver their puppets towards each other. Day menaces Chiyo's pink-haired teenager with her sword. The teenager brandishes her silver dagger, unafraid. They stand, as if each were waiting for the other to attack. Then, up on the platform, Sasori nods his head at Chiyo once. The puppets fly together, slicing the air just inches from each other.

Deidara watches the fight as he sweeps the wings of the theatre. He sees Sasori and Chiyo move closer together as the puppets do. He glances at Chiyo's face transfixed in concentration before focusing on Sasori, whose smile is strangely small and stiff. He doesn't look as happy as usual, thinks Dei. "Not that that's a surprise, un," he murmurs. His cheeks warm, and he begins to sweep harder.

He is considering going home, when something goes wrong onstage. Chiyo's puppet takes a step forward at the same time as Sasori's Day does. Her knife whizzes through the air, meeting one of Day's strings and severing it. Day's left arm, the swordless one, hangs limply at her side.

Sasori's smile vanishes instantly. "Why is her knife sharp?" he asks Chiyo, his voice as cold as a block of ice.

"I couldn't find her prop, so I gave her a kitchen knife instead," says Chiyo. "If you hadn't made that wrong move, kid, your doll wouldn't have been cut, but there you go. I guess you're still too young to know perfection."

"Wrong move!" exclaims Sasori, livid. "I did no such thing. You moved your puppet forwards onto my Day! You did it on purpose, you old bitch!" He maneuvers Day so her sword twists around one of Chiyo's teenager's strings. He pulls hard, and the string snaps. The teenager's head slumps forwards.

Dei, watching below, doesn't catch all their words, but he can see something has gone horribly wrong. He stops sweeping, watching as the rehearsed fight degenerates into a real one, with the puppets dancing lethally around each other as the two puppeteers jostle each other on the platform. He watches Day beat the teenager until her knife and wig fall off, but not before Day's head and right leg go limp, their strings cut. He sees Sasori lean far over the platform's railing in order to make Day's sword cross another of the teenage puppet's strings. He smiles. The reality of the fight makes it beautiful, he thinks. Because the puppets are being destroyed through the puppeteers' emotions instead of simply going through bland, planned motions, what he is witnessing is the creation of art of the truest sort. So, "Sasori-Danna can make real art even if he doesn't want to," Dei murmurs.

Then, he sees Chiyo raise her leg slowly. No, he thinks, shocked. The old lady is too arthritic and normal to do something like that, un. Nevertheless, he drops his broom and runs out onstage.

Sasori sees Dei running onstage, but before he can wonder why, he feels a hard, clublike object hit him hard behind his left knee. His eyes shut in pain, and he loses his balance and slips under the railing. First he feels air whooshing past him, then he hits something hard. Pain rushes through his skull, and he forgets how to breathe.

Much later, Sasori opens his eyes. At first, all he can see is a white haze. The haze soon settles into an unfamiliar roof with a rectangular fluorescent light attached to it. He looks around, and sees white cloth-and-metal walls. His surroundings along with the dull pain in his head and a pine-like disinfectant smell confirm his suspicions: he is in a hospital.

He strains hard and manages to sit up. As he touches the tight bandage around his head and wonders what happened and why the room seems to be swaying, one of the walls moves and a nurse looks in. "Oh," she says, smiling at him kindly. Her eyes flick to the clipboard hanging on the end of his bed. "You're awake, Mr. Akasuna! I'll go get the doctor."

For the next half an hour, Sasori is poked and prodded by a young female doctor. As she checks his vital signs, she explains to him that when he fell, a friend of his tried to catch him but the force of Sasori's fall knocked his friend to the ground. His friend was alright, but Sasori's head had hit the stage quite hard, leaving him with a pretty serious concussion. Sasori sits quietly listening to her, feeling disoriented. He takes the pill the doctor hands him, and drifts back into unconsciousness.

When he regains consciousness, he feels much better. The pain in his head has decreased.

"Danna!" says a familiar voice.

Sasori turns his head, smiling involuntarily. "Brat," he says.

Deidara is sitting on a folding chair next to Sasori's bed. He reaches out and slips his hand into Sasori's. "Can't you think of a better name to call a guy who's saved your life twice, un?" he says, grinning.

Sasori snorts. "You're my Brat, and that's it," he says. "But, thank you," he adds softly.

"No offense, but that's a cheap thank you," says Dei.

Sasori turns bright red. He pushes himself up on one elbow. In a low voice, he says, "What do you want me to do then? Buy you a pony? Kiss you?"

"That last one could work, un."

Dei leans forwards. Their lips meet.

"I told you guys they're queer," says a loud, brash voice.

"You're the fucking queer. Shut the fuck up." says another.

Sasori and Deidara pull away from each other quickly, staring in shock at Itachi, Kisame, and Hidan who had just arrived through one of the moveable walls.

"Yeah, I'm out of here," says Kisame. "C'mon Itachi. Let's go find Zetsu before he starts trying to eat sick people. We can come back and say hi when the blonde bitch leaves."

"I'll catch up to you later," says Itachi. Kisame leaves.

Itachi and Hidan draw up to the bedside. Itachi hands Sasori a box of chocolates. "These are from Pein and Konan," he says. "Pein says you should rest as long as you need to. He's talking with an old lawyer he clerked for to defend you in court for free. The lawsuit money you'll be getting out of the old lady should be enough to cover any hospital expenses you ring up."

Sasori nods. "Tell him and Konan I said thanks."

"How're you doing, bastard?" asks Hidan. "Man, you look like someone's fucked you in the head."

Sasori ignores the last part of Hidan's comment. "I'm ok." he says.

"Naw, you were kissing this fucker," says Hidan, play-punching Dei in the arm. "You must have the biggest fucking concussion in the Universe to want to fuck him."

"Shut up, un," says Dei, play-punching him back. "I don't mind."

Hidan shrugs. "In that case, you're both goddamn loonies. A match made in heaven in fact." He grins. "Yeah, may Jashin fuck both of you and make you each other's bitches forever."

Sasori and Deidara exchange glances. "Uh, thanks?"says Dei.

At that moment, the nurse enters the makeshift room. "Sorry, guys, visiting hour's over," she says. Turning to Sasori she continues, "Dr. Shizune will be around to check you in fifteen minutes."

Itachi and Hidan say goodbye and leave, but Deidara asks the nurse for one more minute. She agrees and waits outside. Dei hurries up to Sasori's bedside. Leaning down, he kisses him once. "Get better soon, ok? We've got lots of things to talk about., un."

Sasori's eyebrows rise. "Like what?" he asks cautiously.

Two pink spots appear on Dei's cheeks. "Oh, this and that… especially about these two puppets I found in a box in the storeroom." He leans closer to Sasori and whispers, "One of them looks so much like me, it's creepy. Are they love-dolls or something, un?"

"I told you not to go into that room!" roars Sasori. "Stupid Brat!"

"So they are love dolls!" gasps Dei.

"No!" shouts Sasori, glaring at him. "All my puppets are anatomically correct, but they're not for that!"

Before he can say another word, though, the nurse enters the room, looking upset. "Right, that's enough," she says. "Please leave, sir."

Dei shouts a hasty goodbye over his shoulder as the nurse pushes him out. Sasori sinks back down into the bed, sighing. "Stupid Brat," he murmurs softly. He opens the box of chocolate and tastes one.

The End

And there you have it. The end of this fanfic. I wrote it years ago, but I forgot to upload it... Sorry if I left you hanging! I hope the ending makes up for the wait. Originally, Sasori was meant to die in the fall, but I decided that would be too tragic. (Albeit, more true to the real story in Naruto.)

Please review if you liked it! If you didn't like it, please review as well; I adore constructive criticism.

Bye!