When A Marionette Is Broken

A Twist of Fate

Pein had called the artistic duo to what constituted as his office. Both men knew exactly what this meeting was about and deemed it more a formality than anything else. Sasori tapped his foot impatiently inside Haruko. he really didn't have the patience for this when he could be making new puppets or perfecting the ones he had. Deidara looked relaxed and excited as he grinned and sat on the chair beside Sasori, looking far too chipper for a jinchuriki collection mission. 'Whatever. He's always been a bit of an idiot anyway.'

"Deidara. Sasori. You are aware of your next target. Gaara of the Sand, formerly shunned son of the Fourth Kazekage."

"Absolutely, I doubt we will face any resistance, yeah." Deidara ran a hand through his blonde locks cockily. "Everyone hates him."

Sasori looked bored as usual. "Did you read the mission briefing at all brat? That outcast is now the Fifth Kazekage. Which means he will have guards posted all around."

Deidara bit his lip and glared at his so called partner as Pein cleared his throat in warning. "Regardless of the preparation or lack thereof it seems. Gaara, current Kazekage of Sunagakure and one tailed Jinchuriki, is your target. You are to collect him without killing him and cause as little death as possible. Our mission is to strategically cause pain to achieve our goals which are ultimately peace and the absence of pain, not to destroy or massacre as many humans as we can." He leveled his rinnegan at Deidara but turned to Sasori as well.

"Is that clear?"

"Yes Leader." Both men said, refusing to look at each other as Pein waved his hand in dismissal.

"You may head out as soon as you're prepared. I expect nothing less than rapid success from you two."

Deidara walked briskly ahead of Sasori and as he turned the corner, slapped the edge of Haruko with his Akatsuki robes. "Watch where you're going." 

Deidara stuck his hand mouth's tongue out at Sasori childishly. "You need to watch your tone. You're even more of an asshole than usual lately."

"As if I care what some impermanent suicidal bomber thinks of me." Sasori said tonelessly his voice deepened by his being inside Haruko.

"Obviously. Glad we agree that we still dislike each other even after four years of being partnered yeah." And with that Deidara slammed the door to his room behind him to pack.

"You better not keep me waiting brat." Sasori called out before entering his own room. He shut the door with slightly more force than necessary causing a passing Hidan to roll his eyes. 

Deidara really didn't have all that much to pack. He grabbed his extra stores of clay and threw it carelessly into his side pouch he kept with him at all times. He grabbed a larger duffel type backpack and put a few outfits in there without bothering to look closely at them or fold them. He didn't care all that much about putting on airs when the mission would consist of kidnapping some loser and not being seen. Not that he wouldn't mind the attention of being spotted, he knew he looked good regardless of what he was wearing. He did throw a hairbrush in the bag because after a long day of flying, his hair would be a total rat's nest without it. There really wasn't much else to pack and as he shoved a small collection of food pills on top, he became irrationally angry about his prior conversation with Sasori.

'How dare that bastard treat him so shittily! To embarrass him in front of Pein no less. To think they'd been partners for four fucking years and the stupid redhead made of wood hadn't warmed up to him hardly at all. Well, that wasn't entirely true.' He mused to himself. 

When they had first become partners, Sasori hadn't shown his true face to him and really had barely communicated with him outside of insults or basic instructions. Just when Deidara thought he was making some headway into actually becoming something close to friends with the older man, he'd back up and act pissy again. Effectively throwing up walls so that outside of seeing his true face occasionally on missions, he felt he was no closer to his partner than any of the other members were. He never talked about himself, only about his puppetry and even that was normally little to nothing. Deidara loved to talk and loved talking about himself even more but cursed himself for revealing way too much in his opinion to his shitty partner.