My Strange Family , The Akatsuki (continued)

Chapter three: a thousand times better

Third Person POV

Sasori was enjoying a nice sleep (or as nice as it can be when you're basically a living puppet) when he heard someone screaming.

"AHH! SASORI SAVE ME!!! DEIDARA'S A HUGE Jerk! OH MY KAMI! SASORI!!!!"

His eyes shot open, recognizing Reika's voice immediately. What's the brat gotten up to now? he thought to himself, already up and moving, heading down to hall to Tobi and Reika's shared room. He pushed open to door... and nearly anime fell.

He was called out of his peaceful slumber to deal with idiots.

"What were you two doing?" Sasori asked, his voice as cold as ice.

Deidara sweat dropped as Sasori twitched his fingers, commanding the blonde to turn around. Out of the corner of his eye, the puppeteer saw Reika scramble to her feet, spitting at the ground furiously, and clawing at her tongue.

"Brat," Sasori hissed, jerking Deidara closer to him. "What were you thinking?"

"Uh, I-I was just getting revenge, un!" Deidara stammered.

"Revenge..." Sasori echoed slowly, forcing the blonde to tense into the most uncomfortable position that came to his mind.

"Sasori, my man! You saw what happened! And I wasn't gonna do anything to her! Just scare her, yeah!"

"So for your revenge, you attacked a kid who was trying to go to sleep, by tickling her?"

Deidara swallowed back his next comment, sure it would lose him his life. Instead, he snuck a glance over his shoulder at Reika, who had Tobi in a strangle hold.

"What the hell is wrong with you, Tobi!" she shouted, knocking his head with her fist repeatedly.

"Sempai told Tobi it wouldn't be that bad!" the still-masked Ninja insisted, before only being capable of making strange gurgling sounds. Reika had her arm locked firmly around his windpipe and she had half a mind to just squeeze the life out of him.

But then, she regained her senses, and realized she was about to kill her best friend. She instantly released her hold on the man-child, letting him fall to the ground without any grace whatsoever. There he lay gagging for several minutes, fighting to take in a breath that didn't burn his lungs.

Sighing, the twelve-year-old turned her furious gaze to the blonde. He flinched, feeling her burning eyes nearly searing a hole in his skull. "I am going to murder you, Transy!" She pulled the sword she'd recieved from Kisame out from under her matress (where she'd left it about a half hour after all the laughter died down) and brandished it at Deidara.

He gulped nervously.

"Sasori, my man, you're not gonna let her kill me are you, un?" he asked his partner, eyes widened in honest to goodness fear. Sasori's child-like expression returned to his brown, half-hooded eyes, and he blinked slowly at the blonde.

"Reika, calm down. Your going to kill him over being tickled?" he asked, his expression never changing. "That would be rather childish, and stupid. I thought you were a thousand times better then, Deidara. Why stoop to his level?"

Reika put the sword back with a pout, knowing that Sasori was right. She climbed up to her bed and glared daggers at the blonde.

As the two artist where about to leave the room, Pein stepped in.

"No more fighting tonight," the pierced man stated calmly. Reika blinked, wondering if he'd heard her scream, or simply sensed something was wrong. Well, she thought that had to be the case, until she spotted Tobi peeking over Pain's shoulder at the artistic partners. She spun around, sure her friend had been behind her only a minute ago. And Sasori was blocking the only exit. How the hell did he get out?

"Leader-sama, these 'kids' needs to be taught a lesson," Sasori said unemotionally, still keeping a close watch on the two younger members.

"I think it's about time that we did something about these fights," Pain went on, raising an eyebrow at the group. "But now is not the time for that." They nodded in agreement.

Sasori motioned for Reika to follow him as he was about to leave. The under-sized girl (small for her age, whatever) smiled, climbing down from her bed, and grabbed ahold of his wooden, yet surprisingly flexible hand. Sasori exchanged a polite nod with Pain and led Reika out of her room and down the hall to his.

"Thank you, Sasori," the girl said, gripping his hand tightly, eyes on the ground. His cold anger slipped away as he studied the small girl. He considered her to be like a little sister, and he knew she saw him as an older brother, who would always protect her. And he was proud to uphold that promise, even if the rest of the time he was nearly as emotionless as the Uchiha, and as irritable as Hidan.

Sasori's room was his workplace, where he kept his precious puppets; either when repairing them, or creating new pieces. The only space not crowded with puppets or tools or scrolls was his bed, and this is where he sat Reika down.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

"Deidara tastes worse than cat piss," she grumbled.

Sasori blinked at her, and she blushed.

"Tobi dared me once..." she murmured, frowning severely at the memory. She'd only been seven years old, and totally naive.

The two question that came to mind for Sasori, the first one being this: "Where did you get the cat?"

Reika laughed. "Don't you remember? Tobi brought back that stray and it stayed with us for about a year. Till it nearly clawed Konan to death, and Pain sent Hidan out to 'bring it to a farm'. I just hope his ritual ended quickly for that little cat." Sasori shook his head, having blocked out many of Tobi's idiotic blunders from the past.

"How do you know what the brat taste like?" This was his second one.

"I bit him so I could get away."

"Why?"

As it turned out, Reika wasn't interested in continuing the conversation anyway. She yawned, stretching her arms high above her head. Then she scooted to the far edge of the bed and lay down, tugging the covers up and over her legs. Sasori smiled slightly to himself and climbed in next to her, leaving her the entirety of the comforters. As a puppet he didn't really feel the cold.

This was actually a very common occurrence for the two of them. As a young child, Reika was often frightened by Zetsu, who tried to eat her on more than one occasion. And as she got older, Deidara, being four years older, he was more intelligent, coming up with better ways to prank. So she would turn to the first person she thought of: Sasori. Sasori was neither afraid of Zetsu, nor capable of falling for Deidara's tricks, so he made the perfect companion for a young Reika. And because many of these frightening encounters had taken place in her room, Sasori had offered his own as a sort of shelter for the girl. She'd accepted the offer gratefully, falling asleep beside Sasori the way young children often do with their parents after having a nightmare. A very fitting comparison, really.

And time was no different.

"Night, Sasori," she mumbled sleepily, turning so her face that her face was very nearly pressed against the puppet's chest.

"Goodnight Reika," he replied, just before the girl who really only turned twelve twenty minutes ago, fell asleep.