Disclaimer: Naruto belongs to Masashi Kishimoto.

A/N: Title says it all, this was the idea I had for continuing 'Dango' in Food For Thought. Reading it beforehand is unnecessary, of course I would like you read it. Didn't put this there since this is more Anko-centric and she's not part of Akatsuki.

Dango continuation

At first, Anko had only one thing in common with Itachi and Kisame; their preference for dango.

0OoO0

Today was going to be 'one of those days'; the ones that left you wondering why you left the safe, snuggle confides of the bed. She patted down the pristine, little apron to find the required notepad and pen in the front pocket and grudgingly made her way to her first customer. Of course, for undercover purposes, she'd have to be as cheery as sanely possible.

She did have to endure a whole lot of alterations and serve irritable customers. Her subtly dyed hair was brushed and tied back into a plain tail, while her face was expertly painted to look like someone else. Even her mannerisms had to be cleverly modified. She sighed; the back straps of the bra were a little uncomfortable and weren't helping, she'd have to buy a different brand.

That's right; Anko Mitarashi was wearing a bra...and being a waitress. Or was that being a waitress who had to wear a bra? Actually, where is the nearest cliff?

...

Someone snapped their fingers; another customer. Anko breathed in, breathed out and calmly approached their table. Ah, they were ninjas and one of them seemed a little frustrated, she smiled, "Valued customer, what would you like?" The larger man looked up abruptly, hopefully not because he noticed she was a ninja too. Anko had to admit though, without a close inspection, she wouldn't have realised they were ninja. Not appearance wise, you couldn't judge anyone at face value, the difficulty lay in their tightly suppressed 'danger'. All deadly fighters had that essence, but the very skilled usually reduced it around civilians.

Though speaking of appearances...they had genjutsu, obscuring their true exterior but not quite a henge. (She would too, but a physical disguise was more effective in her case.) But so far, they were respecting common courtesy, unlike that genin or chunin over in the far corner. There was a ridiculous display of intimidation and annoying smacking of the table. Although the two ninja before her were emitting 'ordinary', she could tell the man closest to her was almost twitching from annoyance. A brawl would brighten her day, her smile widened just a bit.

"Sushi," he grinned triangularly teeth at her, "with fresh salmon."

"Our apologies, sir, but we don't serve sushi here," Anko tapped the pen thoughtfully, imitating the gesture she found useful on another mission, "I would recommend the restaurant around the corner, next to the bakery, for sushi." 'And could you possibly beat the lights out of that pest on your way out?' See? Even her thoughts were moderately controlled; the best disguise is when you can think like your character.

Once again the large man was interrupted by the increasingly annoying ninja, this time his greedy eyes were on the plate of dango that was coming towards their table. Wordlessly, but mentally sighing from the lack of physical damage, Anko clicked her pen closed, walked over and seized the plate of dangos from the wavering waiter. She'd drug this whole establishment of cowards, except for one person, with lactose if it wasn't for the possibility of tracking it back and ruining her work. The chunin grinned smugly, finally ceasing his rant, so she deliberately caught his gaze before returning to the correct table. Clicking her pen open, she smiled at the customer, "What would you like instead?"

Waiting...waiting...a kunai flew towards her notepad but was intercepted by a thin, still sticky stick. She wasn't expecting a defence. It was thrown quickly and during a moment of inattention, so she couldn't pinpoint which customer threw it, but probably the smaller man who was chewing another dango. "Dango's fine," smirked her current customer, or perhaps it was him?

...

It was finally her break and Anko made her way to the counter to order her own dango. The cashier, a sweet girl she surprisingly got along with, greeted her merrily, "Suzuki, your dango's here, a tip from a customer. Or would you like to order more?"

"Thanks Ayane, maybe later," 'Suzuki' eyed her large plate of free dango, "Who was it?"

"Hmm, the younger guy, whose dango that the nagging ninja wanted to hog. You showed him!" Anko grinned back; perhaps she could leave the lactose to Ayane.

...

Anko sat behind the store, a place mildly quieter, to devour the delicious dango. The first stick was splendid, reminding her one of the few good points of her mission. Stacked beneath that stick of dango was another...with something carved into it? She went back, grabbed a small bottle of soy sauce and squirted across it.

Thanks.

So it was a little odd for a ninja to express gratitude to their waitress this way, but it was the familiar handwriting, even if carved into several dangos, that catapulted her thoughts. She had read over quite a number of mission scrolls and reports written by this person, someone who used to be in Anbu, someone...someone like...

Itachi Uchiha.

"...huh."

...x...x...

When they reached a distance far from prying ears, the Mist missing-nin commented, "That was generous of you, Itachi."

His partner didn't even twitch, calmly replying, "Hn, repayment."

That perked Kisame's curiousity, but he settled for one last question, "So she was a ninja then?"

"Correct."

"Heh, not bad," He held a grin, the light showed off his shark-like teeth, but Itachi couldn't decipher the exact meaning behind that statement, so he let it be.

...o...o...

Anko Mitsurashi was officially on leave now. She had handed in that dull mission; her victims had already been caught, and applied for temporary leave. The chunins stationed at the mission room were probably overjoyed. Personally though, she would be eating dango and hunting Orochimaru, whatever came across her first.

Sighing, she rolled over on the bed to face the ceiling of a convenient motel, recalling...

"Six sticks of dango!"

"Only two left, just a moment...Uchiha! Itachi Uchiha! You're here for dango? Here, have the last two, on me."

"Hey! Those are mine!"

Anko grumbled at the memory, everyone overlooked her while endlessly praising those lazy Uchihas.

"Here."

"What, pitying me now, Uchiha?"

"Sasuke only wanted one, so here."

She remembered hesitating, an oblivious miniature Uchiha chewing on dango and the seller grumbling in the background.

"You're more of an 'Itachi' than an 'Uchiha'," she took the offered stick of dango, "I'll remember that."

That was probably her first interaction with the famed Itachi Uchiha, at a dango stall.

...

Anko rolled over further, off the bed and onto her feet. Time was ticking, precious moments that could be used to hunt that slippery snake. The past had past and that plate of dango was probably nothing significant; maybe a subtle comment that he figured out her disguise and she should improve or simply thanking a waitress. Who knows and at the moment she didn't care.

Hastily putting on some discreet, combat-friendly clothes, boots and after pocketing a few weapons, she kicked the door open and nearly hit someone. Oops, but they had moved with the speed of a professional.

"Nice one," she commented lazily then closed and locked the door, doing so that her full attention remained on the other occupant. Tall figure, muscular build and had some sort of oversized sword; figures...men and their toys. But she wouldn't mind one either.

"How was the dango?"

She didn't pause, casually replying, "The nearest stall here sucks, the one near the town entrance is better." Inwardly she was trying to connect the question to anything life-forfeiting, dangerous and threatening she could handle.

"It was a large plate of dango." Anko had a match in mind, but the statement was still ambiguous enough that they could simply be waiting for her to slip.

"Look," she spun round with a hand on her hip, playing along and giving the impression of a pissed woman, the very one most men knew to fear, "Do you need something?"

"Nah," the man grinned from behind a tall collar and tipped his straw hat upwards to reveal more blue skin, "just saying hello."

She felt her lips quirk, sensing a fight, "Well you just did, but you haven't introduced yourself."

The grin widened, displaying sharp teeth, "Kisame Hoshigaki."

"The guy with Samehada?" She did a quick examination of the narrow hall; his sword usage would be limited here. Anko changed her footing into a more flexible stance while the Mist missing-nin couldn't hold it in and charged.

…

Quickly flipping and rebounding from all four surfaces of the hall, Anko went through a series of hand signs and a storm of kunai erupted towards Kisame. He casually deflected them with his sword and hand, imbedding them into the walls. She wasn't disheartened and continued carefully directing the kunai towards her target.

The ones cased aside by the sword were secondary, it was the half deflected by his hands that she was interested in. Anko continued dodging but still took a few blows, thankfully not from Samehada. When a hazardous pattern of black kunai littered the walls, Anko twisted her right hand and half the imbedded weapons returned to slice her victim. While Kisame swung Samehada, she gambled and transported within his personal space and pressed her lips against the gills under his left eye. She immediately changed places with one of the still imbedded kunai and narrowly missed having a limb separated.

Anko was being careful not to use any signature techniques, but she delighted in the battle all the same. Kisame felt the same as he replied, "Not bad."

They moved back into an offensive stance and leapt to attack again when they were interrupted, "Enough." Instantly they flicked away to opposite sides, still posed to fight.

"I was having fun, Itachi." So Anko was correct with her earlier guess.

"You were being poisoned." Smarty-pants, he knew.

Kisame exclaimed, honestly surprised, "What?"

"Miss Mitarashi would only kiss those she kills," Itachi commented and turned his red eyes onto her, "she has an accurate record." Heh, so he only caught onto part of the plan. Anko had used kunai coated with a thin layer of poison, which would take affect in a few hours. The kiss he mentioned was the constant spear of poison on her lips. After her apprentice to Orochimaru all those years ago, her body had become immune to most poisons and a few new inventions; she'd love to thank her former master.

"Tch, I prefer Anko, Itachi."

"Then Anko, would you mind sparing a dosage of the antidote?"

Kisame looked from the two ninja, one a former and the other a current Kohona-nin, wondering about the lack of killing intent.

She turned to Kisame, measuring him up before finally deciding, "I'm not a hunter-nin, so you have nothing to do with me. Do you trust me enough to let me apply the antidote?"

"...what?" The Mist missing-nin was confused; they were trying to kill each other earlier.

"Tch, do you want to stay blue or not?" Anko's focus returned to Itachi, "mind turning off those? I want my kunai back." He complied and she flipped a few signs, the kunai disappeared. Meanwhile Kisame had looked over at Itachi and after seeing how casually the Sharingan user disabled his bloodline, he nodded an affirmative to Anko.

She walked over in controlled steps to demonstrate no ill intent. Kisame was a tall man, so she grabbed onto the sides of his head and pulled it down, making the ninja have to bend his back. They were at eye level but Anko pushed his head to one side to peer seriously at the gills where she poisoned him. "Okay, shut your eyes or risk losing your sight." The circular eyes hesitantly closed. Lick, Kisame resisted the urge to suddenly open his eyes in surprise, dab, done.

"Done, you can open your eyes now." He did and saw a mischievous grin. "Salty."

oO0Oo

A/N: In my failed attempt to continue something else I wrote, I came up with this.

So what do you think, should I continue or leave it like this? Setting it as complete for the time being. If I was to carry on, thought maybe Itachi/Anko pairing or even an unusual triangle...

.

Thanks for reading!

Airily