Black Cloaks, Red Clouds, Purple Nail Polish

Itachi sat quietly on the couch and watched one of his favorite movies "Mortal Kombat". Kisame was out in the back yard wading in the pool while Sasori tanned on the side. Kakuzu had locked himself in his room and was counting out money he had made from secretly selling some of Sasori's puppets to a theater. Of course, they would get one hell of a surprise should one start spitting poisoned needles but that wasn't his problem. Hidan had locked himself in his room as well...meditating on the floor. Little Tobi was wandering around the house going from room to room looking for his buddy, Deidara.

"DEIDARAAAA-CHAAAAN!!" Tobi shouted at the top of his lungs.

Deidara poked his head out of the bathroom. "What the hell do you want now?!" Despite the fact that Tobi was convinced that Deidara was actually a she, Deidara had no choice but to tolerate the good idiot...rules prevented him from killing him anyhow.

Tobi flew into the bathroom and pinned the blonde to the floor in a tight embrace. "Tobi found you!"

Deidara rolled his eyes and shoved the masked boy off of him. "Please go do something that like doesn't involve me, yeah."

"Like what?" Tobi tilted his head to the side.

Deidara thought hard. Well, it had been a while since he had something horrible to that red-eyed jerk...His eyes narrowed as a Grinch-like grin crosses his face. "I know what you can do for your bestest best friend in the whole wide world, yeah."

The one eye visible sparkled with hope. "Yes?"

"Go fix Itachi's shampoo for me." Deidara did his best to keep a straight face.

"Fix his shampoo? What does that have to do with you?"

Deidara shrugged. "Well, if you're gonna ask questions then I'll like go find another best friend to do it. Maybe even Sasori will do it, yeah."

For some odd reason, Tobi was convinced that Sasori was trying to take his place as Deidara's best friend. Panic shot through him and he quickly began shaking his head and hands. "N-no Deidara! I'll do it. Just tell me how."

Deidara tapped his chin while thinking. It was Thursday. 'Tonight, Itachi will wash his hair...' His eyes widened as an idea hit him. He wrapped an arm around Tobi's shoulders and pulled him close, whispering in his ear. Tobi's eye widened then narrowed as he giggled.

"But Deidara-chan, isn't that a mean thing to do?" Tobi looked at him.

"Like I said, if you're going to question--"

"No! I'll do it!" Tobi jumped up and snuck down the hall to Itachi's bedroom. Just like Deidara had said, there was a bottle of Herbal Essences apple scented shampoo plus conditioner sitting on his dresser. Tobi snatched up the bottle and ran to the laundry room.

Deidara heard the idiot run down the hall and took that as his cue to go the living room. Itachi was still in that same spot, staring at the screen as if he hadn't seen the movie before and that this wasn't his 37th time watching it.

"Hey Itachi." Deidara plopped down on the couch beside him. Itachi ignored him, biting the inside of his lip. Deidara turned to the TV and sighed. "You are like no fun at all, yeah."

Itachi cut his eyes at the blonde. "I'd rather not be 'fun' than to look like a damned girl."

Deidara's eyes widened with anger but he quickly checked it. "I bet you think I'm hot, don't you?"

Itachi returned his gaze to the screen. "No."

Deidara smiled. "Yes you do. I bet you'd love to make out with me, yeah."

Itachi shifted uncomfortably. His kunai holster was digging into his thigh. However, Deidara thought this simple motion meant something else.

"Ah, so you would." The blonde tossed his head back and laughed.

"Deidara, I wouldn't make out with you if you were the last living organism on this planet."

Deidara pouted. "Why not?"

Itachi finally turned his head to face him. "Because," he lowered his voice to a lethal whisper, "I don't like boys. I refused to make out with Orochimaru and I refuse to make out with you."

Deidara flipped his hair over his shoulder. "You're just mad because I'm hotter than you, yeah." He stood, walked around the couch, and stood behind Itachi. "It's okay Itachi. I know you want me."

Itachi counted slowly from ten to one in his head while gripping a kunai in his hand. 'Leader will be mad if I kill the 'special' one...must...not...kill...him...'

When Itachi didn't answer, Deidara spun on his heel and went back to his room. As planned, Tobi was standing there and when Deidara entered the room, the masked boy saluted him.

"Did you do like I told you to?" Deidara looked at him intensely. Tobi nodded and Deidara clapped. "Good. Now go to your room and play with your blocks."

"Okay DeiDei-chan!" He shouted then ran out the room. Deidara smiled as he went back to the bathroom and continued to brush his hair.

"Shit." He forgot how many strokes he had done...

~--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------~

Itachi woke up the next morning feeling a lot better. He stretched and yawned, rubbing the sleep crumbs from his eyes. He slide out of bed and put on his blue bunny slippers. He reached up to scratch his head only to feel the blue bunny sleeping cap was still on his head. He shuffled down the hall to the bathroom needing to pee. While he was washing his hands, he happened to look up and what he saw made his skin turn whiter than the paint on the walls.

"What the hell?" He snatched off the cap and ran a hand through his hair. He leaned closer to the mirror and examined his tresses. When he realized that he was indeed awake and that it wasn't a dream, he let out an eerie high pitched scream that would put any six year old girl scout to shame.

The other members in the house all woke to the sound that vaguely reminded them of a loud high-pitched whistle. Kisame and Hidan both shot up like zombies and stared at the wall in front of their beds. Since the bathroom was right next to his room, Sasori was scared shitless and fell out of his bed, hitting the floor with a loud hallow thud. Tobi, who had already been up watching Dora the Explorer in the living room, fell off his mountain of pillows. Kakuzu rolled over and mumbled, but didn't wake up. Deidara woke slowly and smiled.

"Take that, Mr. Wise Ass, yeah." He held his pillow tighter.

Itachi continued to scream, stopping only to take another deep breath and continue screaming.

"What the hell is your problem?" Sasori stood in the doorway with his eyes closed, supremely pissed that he had been woken up this way.

"WHAT THE HELL IS MY PROBLEM?! DO YOU SEE THIS SHIT?! MY HAIR IS FUCKING WHITE!" At this, Sasori's eyes shot open and he looked at the man in front of him. His jaw dropped in disbelief as he stared at, what was normally a silky raven black color, hair that was ghostly white, devoid of any pigment at all. "MY HAIR IS WHITE! WHITE! SOME SICK FUCK DYED MY FUCKING HAIR WHITE! WHEN I FIND OUT WHO DID IT, I WILL TORTURE THEIR ASS FOR THE REST OF THEIR PATHETIC WORTHLESS LIFE!"

Sasori was still speechless.

Kisame wandered in to investigate what could possibly have made Itachi go off this early in the morning. As with Sasori, when he saw the white haired Uchiha losing his mind in front of the mirror, he became speechless.

"DON'T JUST STAND THERE AND STARE AT ME! DO SOMETHING!" Itachi literally shrieked. Sasori and Kisame bumped into each other trying to get out of the bathroom and find some sort of solution to keep the man from losing his mind altogether and attacking them all with his Tsukuyomi.

Itachi was still staring at his hair, tears falling down as his cheeks as he held a clump of his white hair in his hands. "My hair..." He sobbed quietly. This was an ultra low blow. Itachi prided himself on his looks, especially his hair.

Tobi peeked into the bathroom. "Um, Itachi?"

"What Tobi?" Itachi spoke hoarsely, almost having lost his voice from screaming and shouting. However, this did not take away the malice in his tone.

"Um..." Tobi looked down at the floor and began playing with his hands nervously.

"Spit. It. Out." Itachi turned to him, eyes flashing red.

"Tobi did it." The boy whispered.

"YOU DID WHAT?!" Itachi's hand enclosed around Tobi's throat. Itachi started shaking and strangling the poor "good" boy. "WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU DO?!"

"Deidara...told...me...to...put...bleach...in...your...shampoo..." Tobi gagged, trying desperately to breathe. Itachi immediately let him go when two words registered in his mind: Deidara and bleach.

Itachi's eye twitched then he looked back at the mirror. "I have bleach in my hair?" He knew that unless he cut his hair off and grew it back from scratch...it would forever be this color. He could dye it back...but then he would be a fake brunette. "Deidara..." He growled. He would make that little blonde bitch pay dearly.

~--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------~

Deidara woke the following morning to the smell of bacon. 'Sasori and Hidan must be cooking breakfast.' He crawled out of bed and looked at the time. 11:47 a.m. He never overslept this badly before. He shuffled downstairs to the kitchen to see if there really was food waiting. Everyone was in the kitchen, including Leader and Konan, who were inspecting Itachi's white hair.

"Seriously, it's not that bad a look, Itachi." Hidan pointed out while flipping pancakes. Sasori stifled a good laugh while he flipped the bacon strips over.

"SHUT. THE. FUCK. UP." Itachi responded angrily. His gaze wandered over to Deidara who was now standing in the kitchen and his jaw dropped. Never having seen Itachi with this terrified expression, Leader and Konan turned to see what he was looking at.

"Oh..." Leader's eyes popped out of their sockets.

"My..." Konan covered her mouth.

"Jashin!" Hidan yelled and pointed at Deidara.

Deidara looked at them with a puzzled look. "Do I like have something on my face, yeah?"

"You wish it were that simple." Sasori commented after dropping the fork he was using to cook with. Deidara flew to the nearest drawer and yanked out a huge silver mixing spoon. He turned it away from him and used it as a mirror. To his absolute horror, his hair was no longer its natural butter yellow that all of his fan girls loved. Instead, it looked like a vivid king-sized bag of Skittles. His roots were now fire engine red which faded into tangerine orange, then lemon yellow, lime green, electric blue, and the tips were shocking purple.

"Well, I guess we know that someone," Kisame looked at Itachi accusingly, "got his revenge."

Deidara let out a shrill scream then passed out, twitching occasionally.

Leader frowned angrily and looked around at each of the present members. "I swear you all are idiots."

Tobi looked at his blueberry muffin then over at Kisame who was eating his own muffin while reading a newspaper. The butter was on the other side of Kisame. Tobi knew he could interrupt Kisame and ask him to pass him the butter and the knife so that he could butter his muffin himself...but that would be so troublesome. Tobi's face lit up with a joyful smile as he realized something. He could just ask Kisame to butter his muffin for him!

"Kisame?" Tobi tapped the blue man's shoulder. Kisame looked down at Tobi.

"What?" Kisame's voice was deep, in a very romantic way. Why Tobi noticed this, he didn't know.

"Kisame, can you butter my muffin?" Tobi held up his muffin for Kisame to see. Kisame's eye twitched upon hearing the bizarre request. He looked over to his right to see the butter tray and knife sitting there, and then sighed with annoyance. He yanked the muffin out of Tobi's hand and quickly buttered it, ignoring Kakuzu’s howls of laughter.

"Dude, you buttered his muffin! That is sooo gay!" Kakuzu had to put his head down on the table to try to calm himself down.

Deidara groaned and sat up, holding the back of his head. "My fucking head hurts like really bad, yeah."

Sasori sighed, "As hard as you hit the floor, I would suspect it would."

Deidara looked down at the bright colored hair that covered his shoulder and yelled in horror. "OH MY GOD, YEAH! MY HAIR IS LIKE SIX DIFFERENT COLORS, YEAH!"

Leader and Konan redirected their attention from the white haired one to the rainbow colored one. Deidara jumped up and threw his head into the sink. He turned on the water and immediately began trying to rinse it out. Itachi folded his arms across his chest and smirked.

"That's permanent hair color. It's not coming out."

At this, Deidara turned off the water and looked at Itachi. "WHAT THE HELL DO YOU MEAN IT'S NOT COMING OUT?!"

Itachi narrowed his eyes and spoke evenly, voice full of hate. "What part of 'permanent' did you miss?"

Sasori used his chakra strings to keep Deidara from jumping onto Itachi in a blind rage. Leader watched as the former blonde screamed all sorts of insults and expletives at the former raven-haired man, then let his head hang.

"And yet we have the nerve call ourselves evil." He mumbled.

Kakuzu by then had finally calmed down and looked up at the man. "We are evil. The two most self-centered men in this organization were seen crying within the last 48 hours. One of them looks like Gandalf the White and the other looks like he's seen, tasted, even slept with the rainbow!" Of course, this resulted another round of laughter from him, with Kisame joining in. Itachi turned and tried to jump over the table to get to him so Hidan had to hold him back while Sasori had to reinforce his chakra to keep Deidara from breaking free.

"Listen up!" Leader barked and all the men snapped to attention. He sighed and rubbed his forehead trying to fight the coming headache. "Because you all have apparently gone diving off the deep end, I'm hiring an assistant to help keep you all in order."

Hidan frowned. "Why in the hell do we need a damned baby-sitter?!"

Leader cut his eyes at him and Hidan shrunk in his seat. "Because without one, you all may very well kill each other. I cannot have that happening if my plan is to succeed. I've found one that fits the requirements of what you all need. I've made contact with her and she will be here in an hour. I ask that you please try to act like you have some sense. If not...I will punch you in your damned stomach. Got that?"

They all nodded quickly. When Leader and Konan had finally left, they all exhaled.

Deidara cut his eyes at Itachi. "Old man."

Itachi cut his eyes at Deidara. "Skittlehead."

"Grandpa Itachi."

Itachi's eyes widened with anger. "Fruity Pebbles."

Sasori shut his eyes tightly. "FOR GOD SAKES, SHUT THE HELL UP ALREADY!"

~--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------~

Kohana knocked on the door three times and waited. As she waited, she looked around. Who knew that an evil organization was stationed what she considered to be the suburbs? The door flung open and a plant looked back at her. She leaned back a bit.

"I'm here in regards to an application I filled out to be the assistant." Her face was expressionless and the smile she wore was irritatingly fake. Zetsu stepped back and let the girl in. She was about 5'5" with auburn colored hair that had a noticeable red tint to it. Her eyes were black and almost as expressionless as Itachi's.

"Sit down. Our leader will be down shortly." Zetsu grunted. Minutes later all of the guys minus Konan came pouring into the living room. Leader sat down on the couch and Tobi sat down next to him; everyone else crowded around the couch.

"Your name?" Leader demanded.

"Kohana."

"Age?"

"19."

"Do you think you can handle these guys? They are a hand full." He motioned to the crowd. She only nodded. "What makes you think you can handle them?"

"I am a woman. It's impossible to be unable to handle a man."

Deidara nodded. The only reason he had agreed to come down was if he could wear his night cap to cover his hair. Itachi agreed to the same conditions. "She has a point."

Leader ignored Deidara's comment. "Fine. Then you're hired. You will have a 24 hour trial period. If you can last one day with them, you will earn the title of Akatsuki Assistant and will get your own cloak."

Kohana nodded. Leader left leaving Tobi to dive on her and hug her. Itachi and Deidara approached her, both wearing the most serious faces they'd ever worn. "Yes?"

They both snatched off their caps. Her eyes widened with surprise yet she didn't laugh. She looked at Deidara then at Itachi and frowned. "I thought all the Uchiha members were dead except two young brothers? I wasn't aware that an elder from the family was alive."

Itachi resisted the urge to choke and kill her.

Deidara bent down so he could look her in the eye. "Can you fix this, yeah? It's been dyed with permanent hair color."

"My hair used to be black...until someone talked someone else into putting bleach in my damned shampoo." Itachi muttered, eyes turning a deeper shade of red every time he emphasized a word. Kohana reached out and gathered some of Deidara's hair into her hand and examined it. After a minute or two, she finally spoke.

"I know a vinegar mayonnaise mix that will get that out." She spoke softly. Deidara smiled and hugged her tightly then ran to the kitchen to see if they had that. Itachi stepped forward. He refused to bend down to her so she had to stand up to get a better look. It was very intimidating to have someone like Itachi looking down at her so intensely as she examined the damage.

"You could always just dye it--"

"NO!"

She jumped slightly. Never had she seen someone so touchy about their hair of all things. "Well...I'm not sure this is able to be salvaged. The color is completely gone..." Itachi's eyes narrowed. "I can only think of one other solution but the chances of it working are very slim.

"Fine." Itachi nodded once and went into the kitchen as well. Kohana sighed. She hadn't been here five minutes and already had a crisis.