Okay then. I'm a big Naruto fan, and a Ghost Hunt fan (which it seems not enough people know about!), so I thought putting the two together would be fun! If you don't know Ghost Hunt then it's not an issue, since I'll be mainly concentrating on Naruto characters, with the others only making guest appearances. This is a yaoi fic (well, will be in later chapters) and part of a series. I'll be writing lots of multi-chapter stories, which are all set in the same AU verse. That leads me on to my next point – AU!! They're in this world, here and now. The places they go are real unless stated otherwise. This is set in England, since I know to nothing about Japanese everyday life, and I'm not writing a flipping American Highschool fic! has enough of those! (Not that I mind them.)

So yeah, this is AU, in England (Nottingham to be exact) and contains ghosts, demons, spooks, spirits, poltergeists and all other wonderful paranormal entities. Hope you enjoy reading it as much as I love writing it, and please feel free to leave a review. I laugh at flames then eat the flamers, so if you feel the need to be nasty don't bother, I won't give a damn 

And biggest haggles and thanks to the awesome Manu, who beta'd this thing for me, love you sweetie huggles

Oh yeah, I've got some fanart for this on my Deviantart, the link is on my profile :D

I own nothing but the laptop I wrote this on, and the plot.

Haunted eyes.

"...And through Kant's categorical imperative we can see that the ends truly justify the means..."

Deidara rested his chin on his cupped hand and stared dully out of the window. Around him the Philosophy and Ethics A-level class were in similar states of stupor as the teacher read an article at them. Yes, at them, not to them. To be honest he couldn't care less for this subject anyway, but had been forced to keep at it since he'd dropped an allotted subject already and needed the three A-levels to get into a foundation art course. A small smile crossed his face at the thought. Sure, it was only October, but already he was day-dreaming of next autumn in university. Should all go to plan he was going to be taking the foundation course at the local university; Nottingham Trent. Okay, so it wasn't the big Nottingham uni, but it was a decent one in its own right, and good for an old polytechnic.

The blonde sighed slightly as he watched a sparrow hop around in the bush outside the window, his mind filling with ideas of sculptures and paintings he could create of the little creature. His hand was already moving across the paper in front of him, sketching feathers and beady eyes before his brain kicked in and reminded him that he was drawing all over the lessons notes. Not that it mattered; he hadn't been listening anyway so might as well do something constructive.

That was Deidara's problem really; he only cared about one thing when it came to college, and that was art. This had been an issue earlier in his life too; at nearly twenty he was old for a sixth former, but had failed his As levels when he'd first taken them. A year out in the world of work made him decide to try again, and this time had promised himself not to concentrate solely on his favourite 

subject. The resolution was proving tricky, but he'd passed the first year this time round with a modest triplet of C's and, of course, a nice big A in art. Year thirteen was proving far more difficult, as his random bird doodling were proving.

"-dara. Deidara! Are you even listening to me?!" A shadow fell across the sheet he was working on and he looked up sheepishly to see the teacher standing over him.

"Uh...Yeah?"

She sighed, shaking her head in exasperation. "As wonderful as your sketches may be, this is hardly the place for them, is it?" Reaching down, the woman tilted the paper to get a better look at what her pupil had been drawing. A small smile told Deidara that he wasn't going to get into trouble over this one, not that he'd expected to; after having Ms Strachan teach all his RE lessons since Year seven she was too fond of him to get annoyed.

"Hmm, very nice, but not much to do with Kant there. How are you going to do the project if you haven't listened?"

The blonde gaped at her for a moment. "We have a project? On Kant?" A nod affirmed it and he groaned. "Okay, what do I have to do?" A piece of paper was placed on top of his drawing, headed with a question on The Categorical Imperative, and demanding a twelve slide presentation. Deidara groaned again; PowerPoint was not his forte and to be honest he'd have preferred a straight forward essay. Then another line caught his eye; Work in pairs.

Hastily the blonde looked around the class room at the other nine occupants. To his dismay, eight had already shifted to sit next to each other and were discussing the work. That only left...

Ms Strachan deserved a medal for resisting the Puppy Eyes of Doom.

"Can I work on my own?"

She sighed. "No Deidara!"

"But..." Deidara snuck another glance at his soon-to-be work partner. "But it's him."

"I'm well aware of who it is. Now, give him a chance, it's only until the presentation's finished." Not giving him chance to reply, the teacher left to answer someone else's question.

Deidara considered smacking his head on the desk. Hard. Karma was biting him in the butt right now; not only was the presentation on something he hated, but to cap it off he was being forced to work with him. Itachi Uchiha.

The much feared and very much hated Itachi Uchiha.

Deidara knew the stories surrounding his fellow class mate - you'd be hard pressed to find someone who didn't. The dark and mysterious personality that was the eldest of the Uchiha brothers was the cause of much speculation and gossip throughout the school and college, even though he had only started sixth form a year ago. Even teachers were wary of the young man, with many showing it openly. No-one was sure about the truth behind the rumours although it was generally a given that Itachi had something different about him, something weird. That 'weirdness' had been proven a 

year ago when another student - an Uchiha at that – had done what no other dared and tried to bully Itachi.

What had happened had gone down in school history. The silent, unobtrusive Itachi had finally snapped in the middle of the cafeteria – just after Shisui had thrown his lunch on the floor – and had stood up snarling out what sounded like a death curse before storming off. People had laughed it off; Shisui included, and claimed it was just more proof of the other Uchiha's insanity. No-one could have been prepared for coming into school two days later to find that Shisui – the hyperactive and ever so popular Shisui – had hung himself from one of the lamp-posts. No suicide note was found, but CCTV showed that he had been alone and it was his own action, not forced by an outside party.

Even so, after that, Itachi went from being mocked and laughed at, to feared and hated. Whilst some said it had been a forced suicide, the general consensus was that it had been the curse, despite no evidence and rumours ranged from Itachi having supernatural powers, to being the son of the devil. After that anything that happened that couldn't be explained was all blamed on the Uchiha. From people tripping down stairs to all the light bulbs in the history department mysteriously smashing halfway through a lesson, Itachi was said to be the cause.

To be honest it was hard to see how he was even related to the most popular person in school, let alone the fact that he was his brother. Sasuke Uchiha had joined the school in Year seven along with the rest of his age-group, and had been just another midget to tease and give wrong directions to. Then, somewhere between then and Year nine, he had suddenly shot up in the popularity stakes. Now in year eleven he was easily the most admired person in school, even having the sixth form girls all over him. And he'd never once mentioned having an older brother. It had come as a surprise to many when Sasuke had arrived on the first day in year ten with another Uchiha, and then a bigger surprise still when they found out that the silent figure dressed all in black beside him was actually related. Generally a sibling in sixth form was a thing to be admired, but Sasuke made it very clear that he hated his older brother, and it hadn't taken long for the rest of the school to find out why. In a nutshell, Itachi was not a person to be associated with. Ever!

And it was this Prince of Darkness that Deidara was going to have to work with. Bloody brilliant!!

He slowly left his seat and moved to the front of the class where Itachi always sat. Eyes followed his progress and he could feel waves of sympathy rolling off his class-mates as he sat down heavily in the chair next to his new partner.

Come on Dei, it's not like you even believe in supernatural crap anyway. An inner voice supplied. That suicide was a freaky coincidence and he's just a very weird, antisocial person. You know curses and stuff can't exist, so just get this over with and do the work.

"Uh...hi?" Deidara said hopefully, as no acknowledgement was made of his presence. "There isn't anyone else so I was told to work with you." He was met with chilly silence as Itachi continued to read the assignment sheet. "Um, so...how should we start this thing then?"

"Did you not listen to a word the teacher said or were you too busy drawing sparrows?" Itachi's voice was monotonous and low as he spoke without looking up.

Deidara stared at him. He'd been sitting at the back of the room and on the other side to the Uchiha, there was no way that Itachi could have seen what he was doing. His general view of the Uchiha's freakiness went up a notch.

"I..I did listen!" He managed to spit back, "Mostly!" This was shaping up to be the project from hell!

The bell went, indicating that lunch had begun, and Itachi stood up, gracefully swinging his bag over one shoulder – Deidara could have sworn the Uchiha hadn't moved during their brief exchange, yet had somehow packed all his stuff up. Weird!

He followed the dark haired boy's example and shoved everything into his shabby backpack. As he stood he saw his project partner waiting expectantly and groaned inwardly. He had a nasty feeling about what was coming next, Itachi was known for being a bookworm...

"We should go work on this in the library."

Wow. Psychic or what?

"No." A dark eyebrow raised in question and Deidara glared at him. "I hate the library!" He marched out of the room. "We'll work in the Beach-hut."

Itachi sighed heavily.

The Beach-hut was a real oddity.

Any other school would have labelled it the sixth form common room, but not here. Whilst it did serve as the common room, it was technically a Porte-cabin that had been filled with chairs, tables and an impressive sound system. The name had arisen in its first few weeks when Mr Beach had been made head of sixth form. His office had been in the Porte-cabin and some wise-ass had dubbed it the Beach-hut as a joke. And it stuck.

students loved it. – it was warm, was a great place to chat and even had a small cafeteria at one end – Itachi hated the place though.

As Deidara pushed the door open and ushered him inside he could sense the stares even before his eyes adjusted to the dimness of the low-energy lighting. Whispers flew around the large room as he silently followed the blonde to a table by the window. Although it could seat up to twelve, the four people there immediately grabbed up their stuff and moved to another work surface, leaving it to just the two of them.

"Well, that's handy." Deidara said with fake enthusiasm as he took one of the vacated seats. He folded his arms and rested them on the table top. "So, how should we start?"

Itachi had begun hauling heavy text books from his bag, each on different aspects of Utilitarianism. He barely glanced up at the question and answered it with one of his own.

"Do you know anything about this topic at all?" His voice was low and monotonous, like he didn't actually care for Deidara's opinion.

The blond sniffed haughtily. " 'course I do! It's something about not using people as means to an end."

"And..?"

"And...Some sort of imperative, which...look! I can remember the dicks name; surely that's enough for the exam board?"

He look on Itachi's face clearly indicated that it wasn't enough, but he didn't press the matter, turning his attention back to his text book instead. Deidara peered over his impassive class-mates shoulder to see page upon page of blocky text. He sighed and pulled out his sketch pad to begin doodling as he always did. It wasn't going to get the work done any time soon, but that had never bothered him before so he set to placing his imagination down on paper.

Nearly an hour had passed when the bell for the end of lunch rang, making Itachi jump and lose his place in the tiny print. He hadn't noticed the time flying like that, and frowned at the realisation that they'd not made a start on the wretched project yet. Turning to the oblivious blond beside him, the Uchiha was about to comment on this error when he saw what Deidara had been up to.

The page of the sketch book was covered in beautifully detailed drawings of Itachi himself, sitting as he had been with his work. The one currently being worked on was of the moment the bell had rung, and it captured his sudden surprise wonderfully – and accurately the Uchiha noticed with chagrin.

"You're staring." Deidara didn't move from his intent sketching, but the comment was obviously directed at his silent watcher. After a few moments of heavy silence, in which he could still feel the weight of Itachi's gaze he turned his head to look up at the raven-haired student, irritably brushing his long fringe away to do so. "Yo, Witch-doctor, will you quit it? You're putting me off!"

Itachi tore his gaze away from the artwork to meet angry blue eyes – well, one eye anyway, the other was hidden behind that ridiculously long side fringe. He bowed his head slightly.

"My apologies. I didn't mean to disturb you, but the bell has gone and we haven't done a thing. I suggest we meet up later to work on it."

Deidara raised an incredulous eye-brow at the formality of the statement. "Uh, yeah. Whatever." He pretty much ignored his class mate as he stuffed the pencil tin and sketch book into his bag. "See you round." He called casually over his shoulder, abandoning the table and making a bee-line for the door.

The Uchiha watched his departure wistfully. How long had it been since he'd had someone willingly spend that much time in the same vicinity as himself? Too long probably, and it showed. He winced at the memory of his own parting remark, and the awful formality of it. And therein lay the problem. How was he supposed to know what to say to people if he never had people to talk with? Small wonder Deidara had looked at him so strangely – he'd sounded like he'd jumped out of the Victorian era! Still, the blonde had said 'see you round'. Did that mean he actually didn't mind having to meet up again?

Itachi sighed and shook his head with a wry smile. Of course it didn't mean that, it had just been Deidara's way of saying 'goodbye'. It would be foolish to hope that someone would actually wish to see him again. Those sort of hopes just led to painful disappointments, he knew all too well from experience.

Unaware of the scrutiny with which his casual remark was being examined, Deidara breezed happily into his art class. Swinging his bag onto one of the paint-stained desks, then bounding over the chair he headed to the kiln.

There it was, just as he'd left it a day ago – a clay starling roughly life sized, and made in intricate detail. He took it down reverently and dusted the wings off. Perfect.

A space had already been cleared in the centre of the room for this enterprise. Three video cameras had been set up on a tripod in a traffic-light formation, all three linked to each other. The art-teacher had not been very happy with Deidara's idea, but by A-level he could technically do what he wanted, so she'd grudgingly permitted it.

Now the other seven students in the class crowded round as the hyperactive blond aligned the three cameras's and set them to shoot. Standing over the set up, Deidara held his creation in line with the lenses as the teacher started the cameras recording.

Then he let the clay model go.

Little wings whistling through the air, the starling tumbled down, head over heels. There was a moment where the world seemed to stand still when one wing-tip kissed the dirty ground, then the sculpture exploded. Thousands of clay fragments flew in every direction and Deidara let out an excited whoop.

"Now that is art!"

The teacher sighed, stopping the filming equipment. Unplugging the cameras she handed all three to her destruction-loving student and shooed him out of the class room. Fifteen minutes into the lesson and she'd already had more of him then she could deal with at any one time.

Deidara spent the last few hours of the school day selecting screen-caps of the destruction and printing them off. He'd succeeded in printing nearly eleven sheets of the photos in colour before the librarian caught on and kicked him out for wasting ink.

Now he sat in the Beach Hut, an A3 sketch book open in front of him and the photos scattered around in various states of completion. Scraps of paper littered the desk from where the pictures had been cut out, a majority of the pieces glued down from his over-enthusiastic Pritt-stick™ usage and general clumsiness when it came to all things sticky.

A shadow fell over him as he stuck the last photo – the point of explosion – down in his book. He looked up to see Itachi standing by the desk, staring at his art-work.

"The frailty of life." The Uchiha stated quietly, meeting Deidara's questioning gaze.

The blond frowned and looked back at the montage, then up again.

"How did you know...? I haven't written the title yet." He stared at the other student, head tilted to one side in confusion and just the slightest bit of concern. "I only came up with the idea myself about five minutes ago!"

Itachi let his gaze wander over the page again. "It seemed obvious, that's all." He replied. "The brief moment of flight in which life is truly lived, but which inevitably leads to destruction. A metaphor, I would guess, for human existence? We always think we're flying when in truth all we're actually doing is spiralling into our own doom. We think we have control on our lives, yet we're the ones being controlled. And perhaps what you want to say most is that no matter how high someone starts, or what sort of flight their life is, it all leads to the same end." He tapped his finger on the moment of explosion, looking up to meet Deidara's stunned gaze. "But I'll also guess that you came up with this theory after the initial idea. You just wanted to destroy stuff really, and you wrapped it up in philosophical meaning to convince the art teacher that it means something."

Deidara could only stare.

"How did..." He shook his head disbelievingly. "How could you know that?! Even the teacher couldn't see it, and she's got a degree in making this sort of bullshit up!"

All he got was a shrug and an: "It was obvious." From the impassive Uchiha.

"Well..." Was all the blond could manage. "Uh, well done." He'd gone slightly red, and coughed hurriedly in an attempt to cover it. "Um, very poetic description though, English student?"

Itachi gave another small one-shouldered shrug. "I took English literature and language for my IB."

"Oh." Deidara chased out an air-bubble from under one of the photos, then his brain caught up. "Wait! What? IB? You've already got qualifications?! How come? And why the international baccalaureate, why not A-levels? How old are you if you've already got them-"

"Do you want an answer or are you going just keep asking questions?" Taking the vacant seat next to the artist, Itachi folded his arms on the tabletop and looked at him with an amused glint in his dark eyes.

Deidara glared. "Fine then, start with that lot, then I'll ask more." He replied grouchily.

"And why would you want to know anything about me? You've never said a word to me before today." His voice was as steady and monotonous as ever, but there was a flash of wistfulness across his face. No-one had ever asked personal questions beyond the; 'you know you're a freak, right?'

"Well, we need to work together on this blasted project, so I might as well know who the hell you actually are."

"Other than just a generic sick freak? You and every other kid in this place!" There was spite there now, barely colouring his voice, but noticeable enough.

"Yeah, I guess you could say that." The blond shot back. "You've got a chance to convince me you aren't Count Dracula, so go for it!"

The glare that Itachi gave him could only be described as dark, but he nodded.

"Fine then. To start, yes, I took the IB. I've got English, Chemistry, Maths, biology, physics and Mandarin. I didn't do A-levels because I wasn't in Britain, and I'm twenty next summer. Anything else or is that enough for the Spanish Inquisition?"

"No-one expects the Spanish Inquisition!" Deidara grinned, but it withered and died in the face of the Uchiha's glare. He coughed and had the grace to look embarrassed. "Sorry, I'm a big Python fan."

Itachi looked momentarily confused. "Python? I don't understand. You like snakes?"

"Uh, Monty Python, y'know, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Life of Brian..." He trailed off at the blank stare he was receiving. "Okay, never mind. So, you've lived out of the country? Where?"

"Japan."

Itachi wasn't expecting Deidara's reaction, and jumped as the blond let out an excited yelp.

"Japan?!" His eyes were glowing. "That's so cool! I'm doing part of my art on Japanese culture, and I am obsessed with manga and anime! What's it like? How long were you out there? Can you speak the language? Where abouts were you?-" He broke off and held up his hands in mock surrender at Itachi's overwhelmed look. "Okay, okay, I know; one question at a time." He grinned. "So, to start, how come you were out there?"

"My parents sent me to live with my Great Uncle."

"You're part Japanese then?"

Itachi nodded slowly, not quite sure what to do in the face of Deidara's avid curiosity. No-one had ever cared enough to ask so many personal questions before. "My Grandparents on both my parents sides came to England after World War Two, my parents were family friends before they fell in love and got married. So I'm not part Japanese, I'm full. And yes, I speak the language."

Deidara was looking awestruck. "I'd love to go there one of these days." He sighed wistfully. "Why did your Grandparents leave such a great place?"

The slight hint of openness and friendliness on Itachi's face vanished, and his expression looked hunted. "Because they lived on the outskirts of Nagasaki."

It was almost possible to hear the conversation grind to a halt. It only took a moment for Deidara to realise the implications of what he'd just been told – he hadn't taken A-level history for nothing.

"So they...they were there when..."

"Yes."

He nodded in understanding, since there wasn't really anything to be said. "Um...I'm sorry."

Itachi snorted slightly. "Why? You didn't drop that bomb. In fact, your country had nothing to do with it."

"I'm still sorry."

The Uchiha's glare softened. "Thanks then."

There was an awkward silence for a moment, until Deidara coughed lightly, and picked up his sketch book in a business like way. "Well, this isn't going to get a baby a shirt now is it?" The stare he received in response to the odd statement made him flush. "Uh, my Granny always says that, I meant that if we wanted to get some work done sitting around here won't help." He stretched lazily. "The library's shut so we could go to my place to get this stupid thing finished?"

Itachi looked at the blonde in shock. Deidara kept coming out with surprises; Taking an interest, being friendly, and now an invitation to finish the work at his house. The artist was the first person at the college to actually have a full conversation with the Uchiha in the whole year he'd been there, the social interaction unnerved him.

"Where do you live?" He stalled for time, wondering how best to refuse the offer. He felt too uncomfortable in this situation.

Deidara waved his arm in a random direction. "Next to the rugby club. Why? Is your place nearer?"

"Think so, I live at the top of Mill Hill."

Again the uncomfortable pause hit. Their houses were at opposite ends of the small town, and that distance meant quite a lot. The rugby club end was all ex-council housing – two bedroomed terraces where the immigrants, chavs and general lower classes lived. Itachi's end was all posh five bedroom singles, with huge gardens and even bigger price tags. The class system of old was never more evident than in this housing split – Deidara was automatically placed between lower middle to bottom, whereas Itachi was upper class, no questions asked.

Aware that the silence and awkwardness was his fault, Itachi cleared his throat nervously. When Deidara's gaze swivelled back to fix on him he tried to find a solution to the sticky situation, and chose the lesser of two evils.

"We should go to my place, it's closer." He stated the fact like it was a trivial matter, hiding how thrown he felt with well practised ease. "I can run you home when we're done."

"You drive?"

Deidara only got a nod in reply as Itachi swung his bag onto his shoulder. The conversation was ended with that and the blonde had to grab up his own stuff and scamper after the Uchiha, who swept out of the Beach hut, leaving the poor cleaner staring in dismay at the mess of paper and glue left.

The walk to Itachi's house took them up the large hill their college was situated on, then along the top of it. Deidara knew this area quite well, it was a great place to play as a kid since an abandoned 

railway track ran along part of the road. Things had changed since he'd last been up there though. The long fields that had once separated the housing estate from the duel carriageway that ran parallel to the town were a building site.

It was something he'd heard people at school complaining about, but hadn't seen the full extent of the devastation himself. The green fields that had been a haven for dog-walkers, kite-flyers, dirt-track racers and the occasional band of travellers were now a rubble strewn mess. JCB's tore up the earth in great chunks, until it lay ready for housing foundations to go in.

"A thousand new properties are supposed to go here." Itachi said softly, seeing what had caught Deidara's attention. "All three floor town houses. Our houses will be constantly in the shade." He gestured over to the pre-built display house on the end of the row. Sure enough it was blocking out the sun from the older house across the street.

Deidara nodded gloomily, he was going to miss that field. His thoughts were shaken by a drop of water on his head, causing him to look up at the grey autumnal sky. Another splatter of rain to his cheek pushed him into speeding up and running to Itachi, who had already quickened his pace.

Itachi turned off of the long path and followed the road that now went back down the other side of the hill, Deidara trudging along after him. They turned off the main road and down a side street, the blonde nearly bumping into his companion as the Uchiha stopped outside the second house.

It was in the same style as all those in the area – large, red bricked, with a small garden out front. The crab apple tree was full of fruit, and the tiny red apples had rolled all over the immaculately kept lane and into the road.

But Deidara's interest was immediately sparked by the slate grey Chrysler that sat on the driveway.

"Yours?" He asked, tilting his head towards the car.

"Hmm." Itachi nodded, but didn't reply properly, as he dug around in his pocket his house keys. Producing a set that hung from a small but serviceable key ring, he unlocked the door and stepped inside to turn the alarm off. Deidara followed cautiously, still looking admiringly at the car – it far outranked his beaten-up Corsa.

Once inside the house he followed Itachi's example and slipped off his worn trainers, placing them by the door, his curious gaze sweeping the entrance hall. It wasn't what he'd expected, although since he'd been expecting gothic influence and skulls, that shouldn't have been much of a surprise. Pale green walls, with an old fashioned flowery border circling them at waist height, with a red patterned runner leading from the front door to the foot of the staircase – no, not living up to his expectations, thankfully. Itachi gestured with his head for Deidara to follow, and led the way upstairs.

The blonde followed slowly, his steps hesitant now. What on Earth had made him think this was a good idea?! This was Itachi Uchiha for God's sake! Just because he'd been almost human at college did not mean that he would keep up the act at home. Deidara began to wonder if this was the last mistake he was going to make – after all, from the rumours about Itachi it was even plausible that the Uchiha would now sacrifice him to some ancient demon!

It was too late to contemplate turning and running, as they reached the top of the stairs and Itachi opened the very first door on the left. Dreading what the room was going to be like, Deidara unwillingly trailed him in.

"Holy –"

Stay tuned...:D