Suteta - (Akatsuki fanfic)

Part 8

At first, Zetsu thought she was joking. From the smirk on the shark nin's face, it was evident he did too. But then they both realized she was entirely serious. Either she doesn't remember or she really doesn't have a name. Talk about freaking bizarre. No kidding.

"Looks like we got research to do then," Kisame commented. "If she can't remember her name, then that injury must've really done a number on her." He paused. "Speaking of, how'd that happen?"

That's right...we never found out, did we? No duh. "Some kind of blunt force trauma I suppose." Of course, it was just the first logical thought from the top of his head. Out of all the possible things that could have happened, it seemed to fit the bill for now. What surprised him was how the shark nin was willing to listen to what he had to say instead of jumping to conclusions. Anyone else would have instantly twisted the situation into an act of cannibalistic violence. Either way, no matter how he looked at it, Zetsu couldn't help but blame himself for getting such accusations because they were somewhat right in most cases. But not this time. "She already had it when I found her freezing to death on the border."

Kisame's eyes narrowed. "The border?" He gave the girl a disbelieving glance. "What's she doing way out here? There's no way she came on her own-"

"Down!" the toddler interrupted.

"What-?" She started squirming so much Zetsu had to set her down to avoid dropping her and she darted into the next room. "Hey! Get back here!" He hurried after her but she was faster than he would have thought. Not long ago she had barely any energy to use, let alone run! Where the hell is she getting it from now?! He rounded the corner, nearly tripping over the girl and barreling into one of the Akatsuki members. Had he not caught the corner of the wall with his hand, he would have completely lost his balance. Watch it! It's not my fault! She stopped right in front of us!

"Tha's my teddy bear!" she shouted with anger.

"Oh hi!" Tobi responded in a surprised tone. "Why are we shouting?" he continued in an even louder voice. "Are we playing a game?"

Zetsu covered his ears which were stinging again from overly-loud noises for the second time this morning. "We are not! Quit yelling dammit!"

"Okay!" He lowered his voice back to normal. If...you could consider an overly cheery and rather high-pitched voice for a man "normal". Everyone in the Akatsuki found it far beyond annoying, especially Deidara, that Tobi always had to act like a brain-dead child ever since he was recruited. After a while though, most of the members found enough patience to either tune it out or get over it.

The girl didn't raise her voice again, but she still sounded angry. "G-give it back!" She had a whine lingering at the edge of her words as if she was having an anxiety attack and her stutter had returned. Zetsu also noticed she was scrunching the middle of her dress into her fists and trembling slightly with her eyes tightly shut. What was she so afraid of?

"Eh?"

He is so oblivious, that idiot. At least Zetsu knew what the toddler was talking about. Though, he had no idea how she was convinced Tobi had it. "The toy bear. Where is it?"

"Oh, this?" Tobi held up a brown stuffed bear by its arm and pointed at it. So he had it after all. "I found it in the dryer and wondered where it came from, so I came to find out! I asked Sasori but he didn't know..." I get it now. She must have heard him asking about it. Must have.