Sculpting for Dummies

 

An: Meh, updating over breaks is hard. The next chapter or so might take a while. Sorry.

 

And once again, special thanks to my beta,

4eversleeping, for fixing all the mistakes. (If there’s anything grammatically wrong, it’s probably from the parts I went back and added more to, so it’s completely my fault…hopefully I caught them all, though.)

previous chapter 

Chapter 21:

 

            The polished black stone of the Konoha memorial reflected Tobi’s orange and black swirled mask back at him, obscuring the names carved into the rock. Tobi held up a gloved hand to block sunlight from hitting the stone; his reflection disappeared and he read the stone.

            “Any of the names look familiar?” Kakashi asked behind him. Tobi squinted. His eye scoured the memorial.

 

            “Umm…let’s see…” Tobi read the names silently. He knew there must be something important he was supposed to see, but…

 

            “Oh, there’s someone with the last name as you- ‘Hatake Sakumo’. Hmm, a lot of Uchiha…did Itachi do that, or do they just drop like flies?” he asked. Kakashi’s head dropped.

 

            Tobi sat back on his heels and groaned. “Look, I don’t know what I’m supposed to be getting out of this, but I don’t remember anything. Can’t you just tell me why we’re here?” Between the morbidity of starting out their search at a graveyard and the frustration still not finding anything, Tobi’s previous excitement about his past was starting to fade. His stomach churned with a nervous anxiety.

 

            Kakashi kneeled down beside him and traced Hatake Sakumo’s name with his fingers. “I come here every day to remember the fallen warriors. My father: he forfeited the success of a mission for the sake of his teammates, and it took me years to realize he’d made the right choice.”

 

 His fingers moved to a different name, ‘Namikaze Minato’. “My sensei: they say he was the greatest Hokage we’ve had, because he placed the lives of every villager before his own. He was only twenty-five when he sacrificed himself to seal the Nine Tailed Fox.”

 

Another name, ‘Inuzuka Rin,’ “My old teammates. Rin was a medical ninja; before she was thirteen years old, she had saved my life more times than I could count.” His fingers stopped over a fourth name.

 

“Uchiha Obito,” Tobi read the name in a whisper.

 

“My best friend: he was the complete opposite of every other Uchiha I’ve met, but I don’t think I’d be human if I hadn’t known him. He wasn’t a great ninja like my father and the Fourth, but he never hesitated to help a comrade. On our last mission, we were in Rock Country, and there was a landslide. I had lost an eye, and I…I didn’t see a falling rock. He pushed me out of the way…and he got caught in the avalanche instead. The last thing he did was to give me his sharingan eye, so that I could protect the rest of my team.” Kakashi traced the names again, his eye drooping sadly.

 

 Tobi winced as his head began to throb with a sharp, sudden pain. “Can we go somewhere else, Kakashi?” he begged. He didn’t want to hear stories about the Copy Ninja’s dead teammates. It was too easy to imagine what it must have been like: trapped under a rock, feeling the life drain out of you, being scared and alone and blind because your eye was gone, knowing that in a few agonizing minutes, you’d be dead…Sometimes Tobi hated his overactive imagination. He didn’t want to think about Uchiha Obito or any of the other names on the rock.

 

He staggered away from the stone without waiting to see if the silver-haired man was following.

 

………………………………………………………………………

 

            “…The view’s nice up here. I’ve never been up this high before…it’s nice,” the chuunin began to babble. He and Deidara had been sitting in silence for the past hour. Deidara guessed the man wasn’t used to such quiet. There was no noise above the clouds, save the wind rushing past their ears.

 

‘An explosion would be nice right now- loud, flashy, destructive.’ He clenched his fists, longing for the mouths in his palms and his pouch of exploding clay. Then he could make a centipede and let it crawl into Tobi’s ear and blow the bastard’s brains out.

 

He tossed out the fantasy. ‘No chakra,’ he reminded himself. And if he was honest with himself, he knew killing Tobi wouldn’t help. It would be momentarily satisfying, but Tobi’s death wouldn’t make him come back. It wouldn’t make Deidara any less alone. It wouldn’t mean he wouldn’t have to go back to Thorn and be haunted by Tobi’s house, Tobi’s things, Tobi’s scent on his sheets and his memory echoing through the studio…

 

            “How long have you been flying?” Iruka continued.

 

Deidara remembered his first flight- soaring through the sky, filled with hope of a new life, then plummeting to the ground, broken. Why hadn’t he learned his lesson the first time?

 

“Since I was nine, un,” he answered. Nine years ago? Ten? Eleven? He didn’t bother keeping track of his years anymore. What good had come out of them? ‘I could’ve avoided all that shit if I had died then,’ he realized. No Akatsuki, no Thorn, no renegade Uchiha in the forest, no Konoha with their interrogations and their partner-stealing Copy Ninjas…

 

Deidara almost had to laugh when he realized how ridiculous it was that he’d bothered staying alive. Then his brow furrowed. There had to be some reason he’d survived…but he couldn’t think of anything.

 

“That young? Who taught you?” The chuunin smiled at him, glad for conversation. Deidara stared at him blankly. He watched the expressions morph on his escort’s face as he recalled what Deidara had told him in the interrogation room. “Oh…right. I’m sorry.”

 

Deidara turned away from the chuunin and watched the earth sailing by underneath them.

 

‘It wouldn’t be bad if I let myself fall right now,’ he thought. ‘If I fell fast enough, it probably wouldn’t even hurt.’ It might be nice, those moments of freefall before the impact. It might even be the freedom he’d been looking for, that first time he’d flown. As long as nothing obstructed the fall, he’d die instantly. ‘It wouldn’t hurt at all.’ If he lived, on the other hand…

 

Deidara let his body lean over the edge of the bird. Beneath was a stretch of grassland. At least it wasn’t pure rock, like his homeland. It would have to do. He shifted his weight a little more and let himself begin to tumble over the side.

 

………………………………………………………………….

 

            Tobi sat on the railing of the bridge Kakashi had dragged him to, tossing pebbles into the water below.

 

            “A lot of genin teams use this as a meeting place,” the jounin had explained. He backed away and let Tobi explore. Tobi had walked the length of the bridge, surveyed it from every side (even standing on top of the water to see it from below). Then he sat on the railing and started throwing rocks into the stream.

 

            “Nothing?” Kakashi asked sadly. Tobi shook his head. If this place was important, he’d remember it, wouldn’t he? Was he not trying hard enough? Maybe Konoha wasn’t his village after all. It was starting to feel like a waste of time. ‘Sempai will laugh at me when I tell him,’ Tobi thought, then remembered that Deidara was probably on his way home now. The sickly sensation in his stomach returned. Tobi tried to ignore it.

 

            “I got stuck waiting here most mornings when I was a genin. My teammate was always showing up late with some stupid excuse,” Kakashi reminisced.

 

            “Rin or…Obito?” Tobi asked. He hesitated over the second name. Thinking of it made his aching head pound harder. Stupid Kakashi and his morbid stories, giving him a headache.

 

           “Obito. Sensei and I both used to yell at him for it…but when I became a team leader, I started doing the same thing. Weird, huh?”

 

            Tobi nodded absently. “Yeah, weird,” he repeated. He walked off the bridge. He didn’t want to hear about the dead boy; he just wanted to find out who he was and get home to Deidara. Being away from him was making Tobi nauseated. He hadn’t realized it would feel that way when he’d agreed to stick around in Konoha.

 

            “You know, that board doesn’t squeak anymore,” Kakashi told him conversationally.

 

            “Huh? What board?” Tobi wondered.

 

            Kakashi’s smile made his mask ripple. “The board you keep stepping over. It used to squeak, but they fixed it a long time ago.”

 

            “I’ve been stepping over it?”

 

            The jounin nodded. “That was the third time. You altered your pace so you won’t step on it.”

 

            Kakashi’s smug observation made Tobi’s stomach churn. “Oh. Strange. Where next?” he asked. There was something ominous about the implications Kakashi was making, something that made him wonder if he’d be better off not knowing. It wasn’t the first time he’d wanted something, only to find out it wasn’t what he’d thought it would be.

 

            Kakashi watched his every move so expectantly, like he expected Tobi to suddenly remember everything and magically morph into whoever-he-used-to-be. ‘Well, that’s not going to happen,’ Tobi reassured himself. ‘I can’t stop being me, not even for a family.’

 

As he walked across the bridge to the other side, he stepped very deliberately onto the no-longer-squeaky board.

………………………………………………………………….

 

            A hand snatched the back of Deidara’s shirt and jerked him back onto the clay bird.

 

            “What the hell are you doing?” Iruka yelled at him. The artist ignored him and tried to throw himself off of the bird again.

 

            Iruka pulled the struggling man into his lap and pinned Deidara’s arms to his sides in a bruising hug. “Stop it!” the chuunin demanded.

 

            “That’s what I’m trying to do, un,” the blond snapped. He hurled his weight to the left, then to the right, trying to escape Iruka’s grasp. The other man held him firmly.

 

“Why are you doing this?” he asked when Deidara stopped struggling. The artist sagged against him.

 

“It hurts,” he whispered.

 

Iruka guided the clay bird to the ground. When they landed, he relaxed his crushing grip but didn’t let Deidara go.

 

“If you want to talk about it, I’m here and I’m listening,” he said gently. Deidara made a few halfhearted escape attempts, but he found his energy was sapped. He leaned his head back against the chuunin.

 

“We’re in the middle of nowhere. No one is going to overhear us, and I promise I won’t repeat anything you say,” his escort offered.

 

“Fuck off,” Deidara muttered.

 

“You realize we’re not going anywhere until this is resolved, don’t you?” Iruka pointed out.

 

“It’d save you a trip if you let me jump, un.”

 

“I like traveling. I teach, you know, so I don’t go on a lot of missions. It’s nice to see the world a little,” the chuunin exclaimed.

 

“What about the surveillance? That’ll get old quick, un,” Deidara argued desperately. He was ready for it to be over, damn it! He was so fucking tired of it all…

 

“Not a problem. I’ll make Kakashi do it,” Iruka smirked.

 

“’s not the only thing he’ll be doing,” the artist muttered darkly. Deidara had seen the way the jounin stared at Tobi. He didn’t doubt for an instant that Kakashi wouldn’t make a move, now that Deidara was out of the way. And how long would it take for Tobi to forget about him completely? Two hours? One? He had abandoned Deidara to go explore with Kakashi within a matter of minutes-maybe hours were too charitable. That silver-haired slut was probably fucking him as he spoke.

 

He gritted his teeth as a rush of hatred poured through him. That man had beaten him in battle, blasted his arm away, forced him out of Forest Village, and stolen Tobi. If he’d been able, Deidara would have destroyed Konoha for the sole purpose of killing him…or better yet, blow it up while he was away, just to see the expression on his face when he returned and found that Deidara had taken away everything he cared about. Wasn’t there a saying-‘What goes around comes around’?

 

Iruka’s face flushed- he must have interpreted the blond’s words some other way. “We’re not…he won’t…it’s not like that,” the chuunin sputtered.

 

Deidara examined Iruka’s face. Him and Kakashi? They weren’t together, obviously, but there was something there, in the way the scarred man blushed at the implications. How interesting…

 

Deidara decided he didn’t want to kill himself after all. Him, the great artist, give up just because of some piece of shit in a mask? No, there were so many better options- like revenge. And right now, he could hurt Tobi and Kakashi both in one delicious swoop.

 

Twisting a little more in Iruka’s arms, the artist sealed his lips firmly over the chuunin’s.

 

…………………………………………………………………………

 

Iruka fought his instinct to gasp. If he let his mouth open, even just a little, the tongue that was probing his lips and gliding across his teeth was sure to slip in. The teacher kept his jaws firmly locked as he tried to maneuver Deidara off of his lap.

 

He still had Deidara’s arms pinned to the artist’s side. While the position had prevented the blond from jumping off of their vehicle, it did nothing to stop him from assaulting Iruka’s lower half.

 

The chuunin summoned up chakra to propel Deidara off of him and onto the ground. He grabbed the artist’s wrists and pinned them above his head before Deidara could react.

 

“Is this how you like it, sensei?” the blond purred. He winked one half-lidded eye. “I can call you sensei, can’t I, un?”

 

He bucked his hips and squirmed a little, showing Iruka how flexible he could be. The chuunin didn’t doubt Deidara was talented. He kept his eyes trained on the blond’s face as his body rocked seductively beneath Iruka. He held both of Deidara’s wrists with one hand and used the other to push the artist’s chest down and keep a little space between the two of them.

 

“It doesn’t matter what you call me, Deidara. I saw the way you tried to protect each other during their interrogations. I heard the way you talk about each other when the other’s not around. You and Tobi care about each other too much to be playing games like this,” Iruka replied.

 

 Deidara’s face tightened with pain, and those bright blue eyes screwed shut. Iruka stopped pushing the blond down and used his freed hand to wipe away the tears that were beading up the corners of his eyes.

 

Deidara’s eyes peeked open, and he turned his head and captured Iruka’s finger in his mouth. The artist’s tongue caressed it and drew it in deeper until Iruka recovered from shock and pulled it back out.

 

“If Tobi cared, he wouldn’t be in fucking Konoha, would he?” the man spat. “So I can fuck whoever the hell I want, un!” His face flushed red, and more angry tears shone in his eyes.

 

A slender leg wrapped around Iruka’s waist and drew him forward. Iruka reached around behind him and grasped the ankle. Very deliberately, he freed himself from Deidara’s hold. The artist glared at him.

 

“Tobi and your precious Sharingan Kakashi are probably fucking each other unconscious right now, un,” he whispered cruelly. His lips turned up into a snarl as he spoke.

 

As he listened, Iruka’s hand squeezed Deidara’s wrists hard enough to bruise. His reaction made Deidara snort.

 

“Yeah, you know it, don’t you? You saw how fucking eager he was to get Tobi alone. You saw how excited Tobi was when they left together. I wonder who’s fucking who right now. Is Kakashi a top, Iruka… or have you not slept with him yet?” Iruka set his jaw and didn’t answer. He didn’t have to say anything to an ex-Akatsuki member. Deidara gave him a mock-pout.

 

“Poor Iruka. Are you gonna go back to him and take Tobi’s seconds, or are you gonna show them that you’ve got a backbone, that you can fuck around just like they can, un?” The artist lay back on the ground and spread his legs open as far as he could with Iruka’s knees on either side of him. He ran his tongue over his lips, beckoning.

 

Iruka swallowed before he spoke. “First of all, Kakashi and I are none of your business, Deidara,” he replied shakily. He licked his own dry lips and continued.

 

“Second, I don’t think Tobi would be happy if he came back to Thorn and found you sleeping around. And as much as you pretend otherwise, I don’t think you want anyone else. So let’s get you back to your village and forget about this whole stop, ok?” Iruka offered. Deidara’s legs flailed as they tried to kick him.

 

“Don’t you fucking patronize me! Fucking pretending to take the moral ground. You can’t get it up; that’s why you don’t wanna do it! All you damned Konoha ninja are psychos and limp-dicked fuck-ups, un!” the artist growled. He thrashed and bucked, almost managing to head butt Iruka in his frenzy.

 

Iruka stood up and pulled Deidara to his feet, still keeping hold of his arms. The clay bird lowered itself helpfully so the chuunin could pull both of them onto its back. Deidara continued struggling as the bird took flight. His legs dug into its white clay sides until they got stuck, and the shifting of weight made the avian creation shake as it flew, but it stayed in the air, pretty much on course.

 

Iruka kept Deidara restrained, but only to protect himself, not Deidara. The increasingly vulgar curses sounded like music compared to his depressed murmurs earlier. The blond’s despair had given way to anger. Iruka was sure Deidara could survive fury. He would be safe until Tobi got back.

 

Tobi, on the other hand…

 

……………………………………………………………….this isn't the end of the chapter! On to part 2!