Sutures || Kakuzu

Ch. 5 - And Then There Were Two

"Again."

Nozomi took in a deep breath, a layer of sweat covering her body, before brushing her foot into the air, aiming a sharp roundhouse kick at Kakuzu's head. No sooner had he blocked it, she shifted her weight and successfully dodged a punch to her side. The two went back and forth before Kakuzu stopped the match and the female collapsed to the ground with a sigh of relief.

"How was that?" Nozomi looked up at Kakuzu as she fanned her face with her hand.

"It's enough to get by."

"My turn!" Hidan smirked as he charged head-first towards his partner. Nozomi scrambled to get out of the way as the two males exchanged hand-to-hand combat at a speed she couldn't comprehend. She knew Kakuzu had been taking it easy on her but all she could do was stare in awe and disbelief at how far apart their skill sets really were.

It had been two weeks since she started her training sessions with Kakuzu. They were mandatory, but they were not free. Thankfully, there was an easy payment method though - cooking and cleaning in the apartment. In the beginning, she could barely get through half of the day, but now she had more energy to last longer and she learned new self-defense techniques. It was all thanks to Kakuzu, with a little bit of assistance from Hidan.

"Move the fuck out the way!"

Nozomi snapped out of her thoughts as she looked up. Hidan's scythe was flying at full force towards her body. As if second nature, Nozomi pulled out two kunai and braced for the attack, seeing there was no way she could dodge it.

Metal clashed with metal and Nozomi's body slid back from the sheer force of the impact, but her feet never left the ground. At the last moment, Kakuzu grabbed the rope connected to Hidan's scythe and yanked it so the obnoxious tool flew back at its master.

Once she was deemed safe, Nozomi lowered her kunai and looked back at the males in front of her. Hidan had a stupid smirk across his features and her eyes narrowed, automatically assuming he had done it on purpose. "What is your problem?!"

"Shit, that t-shirt really wasn't doing you any justice." He whistled lowly, his smirk growing wider by the second.

"Huh?" She raised an eyebrow in confusion. Looking down, Nozomi realized the front of her shirt had been shredded from the attack and her chest was exposed for everyone to see her baby blue polka dot bra. Horrified, she immediately screamed and crouched down to cover herself, her face red as a beet. Livid couldn't describe how she was feeling at the moment. "Hidan, you jackass! When I get my hands on you, I'm gonna choke you out and hang you by your dick, you fucking pervert!"

"Damn.. Sounds exciting." The silver haired male nodded in approval.

"Quit fucking around." Kakuzu backhanded his partner in the face, instantly causing a nosebleed and a string of curse words to follow. Picking up his discarded cloak, he draped it over Nozomi's shoulders, not sparing her a glance as he kept walking. "Let's go. We'll be dispatched soon."

Later on, Nozomi sat in the bathtub, crossing her arms over her chest. A scowl escaped her lips as she thought of the previous spectacle in the forest. It was all too embarrassing and that silver-haired bastard was going to meet his demise by her hands. Sinking deeper into the suds, she whimpered softly to herself as she thought of Kakuzu's reaction. He didn't even look at her and she couldn't tell whether that was good or bad. Maybe he was being a gentleman? He even offered her his cloak, which felt nice and warm. On the other hand... she could only think of the worst - that he didn't like her.

A knock on the door interrupted her thoughts and the doorknob twisted, causing the female to nearly slip as she tried to stand up and pull the shower curtain closed.