Sasori continued dragging along in his puppet, eyes half-open after hearing nothing but muffled yells and grunts for an hour from his newfound partner. Thinking of a quick solution to shut the blonde up, he tightened Hiruko's puppet tail's grip around the small boy's body—less air equals less lung power, which, in turn, equals less screaming.

Well...it was a good theory.

"MPH! GRHH! MMMMMM!" Deidara shouted in fear, his voice muffled from Sasori's grip.

"Deidara, I'm warning you, if I hear ONE more sound escape from your mouth, I will not hesitate to personally stab you in the chest. Believe me, I'm not doubtful at all on the matter..."

Deidara, despite being blue in the face from lack of oxygen, immediately closed his mouth after hearing his master's threat.

Sasori sighed happily, giving a slight smile while enjoying the brief moment of peace. "Wow, you actually listened to me...that's different." Satisfied, he dropped Deidara from his puppet's death strangle and continued trudging on.

Deidara staggered to his feet, breathing in huge gasps of air and grabbing at his throat instinctively. "Wha...what the hell was that for, un! You could've killed me! About a minute more of that torture and I would've passed out cold!"

"Damn...I knew I released you too early," Sasori growled. "I actually could've gotten rid of you if I had waited just a little longer...I must be going soft. Well, too bad, I don't like to be kept waiting."

"FFFFF—" Deidara spat out, raising a finger to the air. "You're telling me that you would've been okay with just killing m—!"

"SHH!" Sasori suddenly gestured, encasing Deidara's head in Hiruko's puppet tail once more. He dragged them both into a nearby bush, then leaned in close to his subordinate and whispered, "They're getting closer; you need to stay quiet."

Taking advantage of this opportunity to pull himself from the grip, Deidara asked, "Who? Who's coming?" He lowered himself deeper into the bushes to stay hidden, pushing away the hair from his face and tucking it neatly behind his ear for a better view.

"A few of my spies," Sasori responded in a deep whisper, squinting his eyes to get a closer look. "I have many undercover agents in each village that work for me, reporting back details about their village: recent military plans, new laws, out-of-city visitors, potential enemies, completed missions, and such. I like to stay in touch with what's happening, and most of the time, the information is useful for the Akatsuki."

"Wait..." Deidara said after a few seconds, allowing the newly-discovered information to sink in. "So they...your spies...they just...give you this information willingly, un? They'd actually betray their village like that?"

Sasori laughed darkly, shaking his head. "Of course they'd never give me that kind of information willingly! That's why I cast one of my specialty jutsus on them—a jutsu that allows me to control the person under it fully without having them act like a mindless, brain-dead corpse. Basically, that person keeps their personality and recent memory of their life, but performs under my commands without any changes in their average behavior. Understand?"

"So it's similar to how you control your puppets, un?"

"In a way, yes. This jutsu, like my puppets, is another form of control—mind control in this case. But instead of me holding their hand through everything, deciding every single move to make like I do for my puppets, my spies can make their own consecutive decisions, as long as it relates back to the original orders I gave them."

"I see..." Deidara said, unconsciously looking up at the slightly-descending sun. "So if these guys work for you and are under your control...then why are we hiding from them...?"

Sasori shifted his gaze slightly upward, trying to get a better view of the approaching people. "Because sometimes I get a little more than I bargained for."

"...What?"

Grunting, Sasori went on to explain. "I've had a few occasions when one of my spies would come back with a tagalong...someone that isn't my spy. In most cases they were just some moron from my spy's village that noticed something suspicious and decided to follow and see what was going on for themselves. But in the end it doesn't really matter, they just end up getting killed and I gain another puppet. In a way, it's more good than bad...for me, at least. I'm not sure how the victim feels about it." He chuckled darkly, continuing to scan the area around him for any signs of unwanted guests.

Deidara sat there utterly confused, once again trying to get everything straight in his brain. "What exactly to you mean by you 'gain another puppet', un...?"

"Oh that's right...you don't know, do you?"

"Know what?"

Sasori smirked, preparing himself to enjoy the shock on that brat's face once he heard about his much loved hobby. "Unlike most shinobi, I'm not a very good combat fighter. I'm not skilled in hand-to-hand fighting, and most ninjutsus are a waste of time in my eyes. My means of defense and offense happens to be one of my favorite things in the world...my art: making puppets."

"You're an artist, too?" Deidara perked up, smiling widely, his face practically glowing. "Why didn't you tell me sooner? It's nice to finally meet a fellow art-enthusiast amongst all this chaos!"

"Whoa whoa whoa, hold up a minute," Sasori growled. "No, unlike you, I happen to be a REAL artist. I don't create my puppets simply from wood, I craft them from the bodies of actual once-living people, entitling each one to its own special abilities and traps. You see, the only true kind of art is eternal, unlike that shitty exploding clay you throw around like a maniac, daring to call it 'art'."

Deidara clenched his fists and gritted his teeth, his face steadily turning deeper shades of red out of embarrassment and anger. "WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY TO ME, UN?" he screamed. "You...you're just messed up! I respect your view on art being eternal, even if it's the complete opposite of mine, but killing people solely for the purpose of turning them into weapons that you call art? And worst above all, now you're criticizing MY art, un?" The blonde stood up as to appear more threatening. "How dare you! I won't stand for i—!"

Sasori rolled his eyes and dragged Deidara to the ground once again with the help of Hiruko's tail. "Dammit, brat, shut the hell up! Don't you realize the situation we're in? We're trying to stay hidden, you idiot! BE. QUIET."

Deidara huffed, desperately wanting to attack Sasori for the ill words spoken against him. Instead he ducked back down behind the bushes, trying desperately to contain his anger and obey his master.

After another minute or two, Sasori spoke up, keeping his eyes locked on the spies. "Okay...they're very close to us now, and it appears no one else is with them."

"Wooooow, good observation, un. It only took you ten minutes to finally figure that out."

Sasori shot his partner a piercing glare. "Deidara, this is my last warning... We already have to kill two people today, don't make it three."

The blonde's eyes widened as he took in the deeper meaning of Sasori's threat. "Wait, you're saying we have to kill two people today? We as in...both of us?"

"Yes, both of us, you dim-wit! That's why I said we."

"Um, I don't think I'm ready to...kill someone yet."

"Well, too bad, because within the next five minutes, you're going to have to be ready to kill someone. That's what shinobi do...at times we have to kill our enemies."

Deidara stared petrified at his master. "Within the next five minutes? B-but...there's no one here to kill, un! You said there weren't any unwanted tagalongs watching us, and besides that, the only ones here are your spies and us!"

"Exactly...we'll be killing two of my three spies. They're of no use to me anymore. Besides, since I'm going to be stuck with you as my partner until one of us dies, I need some new puppets to work on so I don't go completely out of my mind..."

Deidara was speechless. He stammered uncontrollably, looking around randomly at the terrain around him. "Y-y-you can j-just throw away p-people's lives like th-they're n-n-nothing?"

"Well, yes, it's not that difficult," Sasori responded plainly. "It's either do or die out here. Now, stay here in the bushes until I call you out. I need to go collect their information..."

As Sasori scooted away, Deidara made sure to stay put, remaining completely still while focusing on nothing but his breathing. He knew that this day would come, that one day he would have to kill people—that's what ninjas do, after all—he just didn't expect it to be so soon...so sudden.

The next few minutes moved by like seconds when Deidara was awakened out of his trance by Sasori screaming, "Deidara, now!"

Without thinking, Deidara jumped out of the bushes to his master's aid, reaching inside his side pockets for a handful of clay.

Sasori motioned to a girl a few feet ahead of him on the right. "Michi! Her! Kill her, quickly!"

Deidara stood frozen in place, staring at the girl that, in a matter of seconds, would be his first murder victim. He analyzed her, allowing his emotions to, once again, take over. This girl...she...she had a life once...she has a name...Michi. She's tall, has dark brown hair and bright orange eyes, looks only about eighteen or nineteen years of age...and I bet she has dreams, too...dreams...dreams that will never come true...all because of me. She probably has ambitions...secret hopes that she'd kept in her heart since she was young. How can I kill something that...something that hasn't served its full potential yet? How can I just relinquish someone's right to live their own life?

Deidara looked to his left as Sasori easily finished up his own battle, piercing his spy's heart with a thin blade that was equipped with Hiruko. The defeated man fell backwards, limp and useless, on the ground next to the third spy as he watched—a man in his early twenties with gray hair and glasses.

With a quick gulp of air, Deidara turned his attention back to his own battle. He molded pieces of his detonation clay into two large inchworms, sending them around the girl, tightening their grip around Michi's throat. The blonde bit his lip, holding back the burning tears forming in his eyes, and yelled, "KATSU!" With that, an explosion with a radius of about ten feet burst out, and Deidara watched silently as the girl was ripped apart, reduced to nothing but a pathetic pile of ash.