SasoDei - Ocean Blues - Part 2

SasoDei - Ocean Blues

A Sequel to Underneath Thunderstorms

Part Two

A Commission for TerraKuman97

Two days had passed since the red head's disappearance, and there was still no sign of him. Many of the Akatsuki had relinquished their search to return to the normality of the merfolk lifestyle, but Deidara and Konan had yet to give up. They had spent each day searching Sasori's usual swimming locations, but with little luck.

Deidara refused to believe that Sasori would have just left him without a single word, and Konan thought the same thing. After all, she had once had to make the decision between the ocean and the land many years before. However, chances of finding the red head grew slimmer with every day that passed.

"We're never going to find him, un!" Deidara bit his lip in dismay, but it was not dismay that he felt, but anger. "After all those years of waiting for him, and then he goes and gets himself kidnapped! He could have been eaten by a fucking shark for all we know, un!" He growled and continued to gnaw at his lip.

"We will find him, Deidara; alive and in one piece." She smiled, but neither the gesture nor her words could appease him of his anger. He thought that, after waiting so many years for Sasori, he would finally be able to live a happy, unlonesome life. He felt cheated by the world.

"Why did my mother have to promise me to a human anyway, un? She could have just worked up the courage to walk onto the shore and grab me herself, but no. She just had to wait for someone else to come and help me! I can just imagine the thought that went through her mind once little Sasori toddled down to the shoreline and found me!" He raised the pitch of his voice mockingly and batted his eyes, his actions emphasised with fury. "'Oh, look at that human! I bet he will be haaaaandsome when he grows up! Oh, I know! I will promise him to my newborn son! I am suuuure that they would make such a lovely couple! What about his inevitable hate for humans? Oh, I am suuuure he won't mind! Oh, and the fact that he is a baby and therefore I don't even know his ultimate sexuality? Pfft, he's my son; of course he will be into men when he is older!' Gee, thanks a lot, mother, un!"

"Well," Konan grinned as best she could, "at least she got that last point right."

Deidara shot her a warning look, before sighing away his frustrations. "Don't get me wrong…I loved my mother, and I love Sasori. I love him with all that I am. That's why I am so angry at the world…I know that I have you guys, but I have always felt so damn lonely all the time. That finally went away when I was with Sasori, un…" He smiled for a moment, but it faded all too soon, "If the world takes him from me, just like they took my mother, then I know that I will always be lonely. I cannot live like that. Never again."

"I know, Dei." Konan placed a hand on his shoulder, but even she could not force a reassuring smile anymore. She knew that it was like to be lonely. When she had been a teenager - and still human - her parents, siblings and home had been lost in a fire that had swept through the town. Konan had only survived because she had been sleeping with her window open, against the wishes of her parents. As soon as the flames were in her room, she was out of the house, not even thinking about her mother and father and sisters until it was too late.

She had lost everything. The only life that had awaited her was of streets, poverty and prostitution. And loneliness. The same loneliness that she had always seen in Deidara, and the same that she had seen in Sasori when they had first met. The red head had lived a lonely life too, and that was why Konan knew that he would have never just left Deidara. He would only be ruining himself.

Just as Konan was about to speak, a flash of colour appeared in the distance. The figure was moving, and was definitely alive. For a moment she could sense the hope in the water, but a few moments later it fell back into despair. The figure ahead was not Sasori; it was a mermaid by the name of Ino.

Konan had once caught her in their territory, but it had been obvious that the only thing the blonde mermaid had been interested in were the flowers of the area. In the end, the blue haired mermaid had allowed the Konoha girl to come and go from the Akatsuki territory as long as she did not cause any trouble. Deidara instinctively glared at her, but Konan had been sure to alert all of the Akatsuki of the girl's presence in their territory.

Once they neared, the girl finally looked up at them, an expression of both surprise and relief on her face. "Konan! It is good to see you!" She smiled and eagerly turned her attention back to the undersea blooms. "Aren't they beautiful?"

"Of course they are." Konan had always loved the flowers here, but today there was no time to waste on blossoms. "Hey Ino, did you happen to see a merman pass this way? He has red hair and a red tail to match, along with the usual Akatsuki necklace."

"Oh, you mean Sasori?" She withdrew her attention from the flowers once again. The merman tensed at the mention of the name, and Konan also brightened up.

"You have seen him, un?"

"Yeah, he swam this way a few days ago." She shrugged her shoulders and settled her tail down on a rock, careful not to cover the flowers. "He went after a school of fish. It looked really weird actually." A very thin smile curved her lips, but there was a clear caution in her motions. "He was a little stupid, if you ask me. He went right up near the surface of the water, and I doubt he even realised that there was a boat in the area."

"A boat?" Both Konan and Deidara pipped up at once, and the blonde mermaid nodded with a shrug.

"Yeah. I didn't really see much of what happened. I saw the fish get scooped up in a net, and Sasori had disappeared along with them." She shrugged, but both females were shocked when Deidara suddenly lurched forward and grabbed Ino by her hair. "Ow! Ow! Ow!"

"Why didn't you do anything to help him?" Deidara's voice was a vicious growl, and he bore his teeth as he pulled harder on her hair. "He was taken by humans, and you just sat and watched, un!"

"Deidara!" Konan grabbed the boy's wrists, tightening her own grip until Deidara finally let go of Ino's hair. The blonde mermaid swam a few paces away, but at least she did not flee.

"Why would I help him?" Her own voice was a growl as she fussed around with her flowing hair. "He is an Akatsuki! I only come here for the flowers. Aside from Konan, I have no warmth for your clan." She stuck up her nose and stopped messing with her hair so that she could cross her arms. "Besides, there is the sea-wide assumption that you guys are capable of looking after yourselves."

"You could have at least alerted us, un!" If looks could kill…

Ino flicked some hair out of her face and smiled at him incredulously. "Are you kidding me? I am only allowed in this area of your territory because it is near the border! If I were to go any deeper into your territory, then I would be killed on sight!"

Deidara bit his tongue, knowing that what she said was true. There was no tolerance for outsiders in Akatsuki territory. If she were to go anywhere beyond the sea-flower field, there was the possibility that she would find their settlement. If she knew that location, then Pein would have to make sure she would never tell anyone from her clan. Only death awaited her in Akatsuki territory.

"Do you know anything about the ship?" Konan broke the silence, and Ino responded firstly by shrugging her shoulders.

"I didn't catch a name or anything. I certainly am not dumb enough to go up to the surface while there is a ship around!" She returned to fiddling with her hair, as if she were assessing her knowledge. "I did see the direction that it was headed though."

"You did?" Deidara brightened up in an instant as hope suddenly filled the air. "Where did it go?"

Ino shot him a sinister glare before turning to Konan, clearly disliking the blonde, which was not unsurprising after his earlier assault. "It was headed in that direction." She pointed behind her, towards the area that all merfolk avoided.

Land.

-x-

The room was a blur of weight and sleep. Sasori felt unbelievably heavy, lying on the hard bed, resisting the overpowered urge to fall into unconsciousness.

Ever since he had been brought to the room, he had been under heavy sedation. He knew that all he had to do was stand up and walk out the unlocked door, but his body refused to move.

His vision grew blurred as a wave of sleep tried to overtake him, but he fought the current with all the energy he had left. Sasori remained awake.

He still wore the clothes he had found on Orochimaru's ship, and he was almost grateful that no one had attempted to undress him. Even the snake of a man had done little more to Sasori after that kiss. The red head was merely property, and Orochimaru could not afford to damage him.

"Well, look at those sweet, bedroom eyes of yours~" Sasori only noticed Orochimaru after he had spoken. The snake had been sitting on a chair in front of him for who knows how long, and Sasori had failed to see him. The sedatives were even stronger that he had thought.

Sasori tried to speak, but he could barely move his tongue, let alone his lips. The only movement he could manage was the closure of his eyelids, but this only invited sleep. Just like that, he was lost in dreams.

-x-

The shore looked dark and foreboding in the darkness of night. Deidara felt disgusted at the mere sight of it, although he knew this sense of disgust was actually fear. It had been a long time since he had seen dry land this close, and he knew that their journey would only begin at the shoreline. "Do you really think he is somewhere is this town, un?" Deidara looked around, his face sour and sorrowful.

"We have no choice but to check it out." Konan was leading the way around a rocky outcrop, and her eyes were carefully scanning the area for danger. "Sasori is probably being held captive somewhere, and we have no idea what his captive's motives are, or even if they have a motive."

"Let's just get this over and done with." Deidara glared at the land, and his fear only grew once he heard the call of human voices. He hid most of his body underneath the water in panic, but Konan merely watched the two humans who went running, naked, into the ocean. It was obvious that the man and the woman had failed to notice the two merfolk hiding within the shadows, and in any case, they were far more interested in one another to look around.

"Young love." Konan smiled gently before turning her attention back to the mostly-submerged blonde. "Before we go diving into things, I want you to think really hard. What is it that humans have?"

"No sense of humour." Deidara said the first thing that came to mind, and this answer forced Konan to roll her eyes.

"Modesty; humans have modesty. Meaning that they also wear clothes, correct?" The blonde was blank and disgruntled, and Konan questioned why she had brought the human-hating merman along for the rescue mission. "Therefore, if we want to walk down the street without drawing attention, we have to get some clothes."

"Why, un?" He lifted an eyebrow and gestured to the (really) happy couple, skinny-dipping in the ocean. "They don't seem modest at all."

"It's different..." She suddenly paused as an idea crossed her mind. "Wait a second…Exactly!" Deidara tilted his head and she continued to sneak to the shore via the darkest of shadows. "Oh I am a genius!"

-x-

The streets were empty, but for a few drunkards on their hobble home and the peculiar duo who wandered the streets aimlessly. The male stumbled while he walked, and he had an arm over the girl's shoulder as she helped him. Any onlooker would have simply assumed that the woman was merely trying to help her drunken husband home. The truth was beyond their imagination.

"This is so uncomfortable, un. I don't know why humans bother." Deidara tugged at the shirt, feeling constricted by the clothing. It was annoying and itchy, and his alabaster skin was not used to human material.

"It's kind of ironic when you think about it." Konan grinned as she continued to help the struggling Deidara to walk on his new legs. He must have practiced with Sasori around, for the blonde was not doing such a terrible job of walking, even if he did require Konan's assistance. "We earned our modesty through human immodesty." She continued to smile, but Deidara just shot her a look of disdain. She could not blame him; the land was a strange place for sea dwellers, just as the sea had been so strange for her.

Konan remembered the day when she had joined the merfolk. It had been a week since she had lost everything, and she had been on the verge of starvation. Her clothes had already turned to tatters, and she had become a shell of the girl she had once been. On the same shore they had walked merely an hour ago was where she had decided to end it all. Standing on that shore, she decided to leave the world behind.

She dived into the water and she started to swim. Her mind had been set. She would swim. She would swim even when she could swim no more. There would never be a return for her, for there was nothing to come back to.

After days of swimming aimlessly, she had barely been able to move her limbs. She had started to sink, but she never ended her struggle. Only when her consciousness gave up did she finally stop swimming. She did not know what happened after that, but eventually she had awoken to find herself on a small cay. And he had been there.

Pein had sat beside her, looking both curious and concerned, and he had innocently been offering her a live fish. On the verge of starvation and dehydration, at the sight of the stranger offering her a fish, she had been unable to control her tired laughter. It seemed utterly absurd, and she had been unable to stop laughing for a long time.

Now back on the streets that she had deserted long ago, everything seemed both different and eerily the same.

"So where should we go?" Deidara continued to tug at his clothes, and Konan returned to reality.

"Easy. We head over to the Serpent's Tail." She pointed ahead, at a building with light pouring out of its dirty windows. "If there is a merman in Sunagakure, they would know there. But to blend in there, we have to act like the fearsome Akatsuki we are."  A sly smile curved her lips, and her eyes grew cold.