Project Logos

A/N: uh guys, i got no reviews on the last chapter, and im in a really bad mood right now. if i don't get something out of this i'll stop posting, i mean it. im not usually a bitch like this but today i think i have a reason to be a bitch. thats the way it is...

P.S. there's some smex coming, so it would be a shame to kill it now...

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Sasuke walked away from the Logos building, now shimmering in the filtered down noonday light. He was two stories above ground level, a fact he didn't really think twice about, having lived in the upper levels of the city since he was small, but the sunlight was still hot and bright down there. He had a purpose to his step today, because today he felt like he would make his Aniki proud of him. Today he would be able to help Itachi with something, and maybe he could prove that he was good enough to be let into the lower labs this time.

He had recognized one of the faces from the tape, not any of the people inside of the building, their faces had all been well masked, their eyes covered against second hand retinal scanning. No, it was the two shots of the getaway van, the driver there was the one he recognized. It had been Neji Hyuuga, a member of the second house of the Hyuuga dynasty.

The first house of the Hyuugas controlled their techno-dynasty, running some of the biggest hardware companies in the field, and some of the larger software companies as well, though mostly through shadow plays and underground deals. They weren't really into scientifics and the synthetic biology that the Uchiha corporations made most of their money off of, but they were a big competetor, and the two families had had a rather amiable, if icy and competetive, relationship over the years.

The second house of the Hyuugas mainly just served to follow the first house, though many of the second house members he had met were really bitter and petty individuals, easy to bribe and lead away from their tasks, jealous of the first house at every turn, accept when they were watching. Neji wasn't really like that though, he had some belief about fate and good service, or something of the like, and he was always working hard to please the first house, and his cousin, some stuttering little girl Sasuke had never really paid much attention to.

While both of the Hyuuga children went to the same prep school that Sasuke did, the girl had faded into the background for him, and it was Neji who stood out. The boy was smart, hard working, and damn good looking, if Sasuke were to admit it to himself. He was also an insufferable bastard, which Sasuke thought must have been a family trait.

Still, now the image of Neji's face brought a smile to his lips, because he knew the boy could be tied to this somehow. He would find the Hyuuga, and confront him with this irrefutable proof, and somehow he would get the boy to tell him who those other people were, and where the precious experiments were now. He could probably even get the boy to tell him what was so precious that his Aniki would let himself be dragged out of bed before dawn to come try and help recover it.

Whatever it was, it was important to Itachi, and that was why Sasuke promised himself he would find it, in one piece, and bring it back to his brother.

X

Shikamaru swore quietly under his breath as he very carefully put away the equipment used in the last run. He catalogued each small imperfection, each new battle scar, and set aside anything that might be malfunctioning to work on. It had been a tough day for him, so he set aside a couple of things that worked just fine as well, just for good measure. It would give him an excuse to lock himself away in his workshop later, and not have to listen to the girls fawn over the two new things hanging out downstairs.

He'd put them into isolation as soon as he'd laid eyes on them, doing a couple scans to make sure they were safe, which he still wasn't entirely sure they were. He knew they were fairly stable though, even if there were things about their genetic makeup that still baffled him. He was sure they were some form of a chimeric creature, combined from different DNA's, probably in the early stages of development because they seemed remarkably stable in overall composition.

He'd taken some smaller tissue and blood samples, which had gained him a rather large, but not very serious, bite to the arm from the blond one, and a glare from the other that was in some ways a lot more unsettling. He had set the samples aside to study once he'd gone over the equipment and inventoried everything, though he did set up a few precursory tests before he'd started this.

He sighed, a heavy and practiced sigh, as he heard the racket from the hallway that could only signal the arrival of one thing: The infamous green beast. He might have smiled at the nickname in his head if he wasn't doing so many other things at the moment. It was too much work to smile, and the arrival of Lee meant there would be more work to do soon enough.

The boy usually cleaned out the van after each run, making sure things were stocked back up inside, and he liked to talk to Shika while he did it. This mostly amounted to Shika nodding while Lee boomed on about how much he enjoyed saving young animals in the springtime of their youth, and the evils of the giant companies and their biotechnology projects.

Lee had grown up on a hydroponic farm in another sector, his parents were killed when he was young, but he was taken in by an uncle, who had raised him to be the kind, gallant, and totally maniacal beast that sat before Shika today. He sighed, at least the boy could fix the hydroponic systems for the building when they broke down, ensuring them a steady supply of just about everything they needed for the endless supply of animals that kept flowing through their facility here. He was also very good with engines, and other rather simple mechanics, and had found them the van they used today, fixed it up until it purred like a kitten, and kept it that way ever since.

He was useful for them, there was no doubt about that, but most of the time Shika thought that he was too troublesome anyways. He sighed heavily, flipping the switch on his earphones to high white noise and focused once again on the task at hand.

X

Sakura beamed as she carried the plate of assorted vegetables and meat products out to the little room where their new guests were staying at the moment. When she had left them an hour or two ago, the blond one had been asleep, and the other one had just stared at her menacingly until she left to go do other things. She figured the quickest form of peace offering would probably be food. Hell, it worked on pretty much every person she'd met, including the ever surly and put out Shikamaru, and she figured the guests they had liberated from the Logos labs were close enough to human to make this an analogous case.

She was happy to see the blond one was awake when she keyed the door open with a sequence of keys and a soft whirring noise. She had to say she liked the blond one more, he was adorable and innocent, and he loved to talk, and look at the magazines she gave him. He'd said he couldn't actually read, but that his friend there could and would do so often, so she'd left a stack of travel magazines and national geographic, all catalogued onto separate disks they could slip into the room's cued entertainment systems and watch on the small table screens in the corners.

She smiled back at the blond boy as he pulled his face away from the console to the left, a beaming grin splitting his face as he jumped to his feet. It took all of two second for Naruto to be all over her, asking questions, peaking onto the platter she carried, playing with the ends of her long, pink hair, and telling her all about how the two of them had spent the little bit of time when she'd been absent. She set the platter down on the flat center console, pushing over a wheeled stool and straddling it.

Naruto came running up immediately, sitting on the bench across from her. Gaara still eyed her with mistrust from the console across the room, where he was watching a clip of a large animal hunting engineered prey in a game reserve somewhere in New Russia. She shuddered a little at the look in his eyes, how similar it was to the gaze of one of the sleek black creatures circling live prey in the savannah. Still, she shook it off, smiling and turning to Naruto.

"So, what do you like to eat, babe? I brought a little bit of everything, but I can make you other things if you'd like." Naruto's face lit up as he gazed at the platter, picking out a handful of raw snap peas and a skewer of some sort of cooked whitefish. She smiled, making note of the boy's apparent favorites, from what was laid out. Soon sweet peppers, carrots, chicken, and pork were added to the list. She tucked it away, smiling softly as she noticed Gaara slinking towards her, a mistrustful gleam in his eye. She heard his stomach rumbling though, and invited him up.

The other boy ate some as well, but not nearly as much as Naruto tucked away. It was heartwarming how they worked together though, and soon the platter was gone, even though Gaara had to almost push the celery down the blond boy's throat. Sakura wished she had a camera handy for the moment after though, when Gaara cleaned Naruto's face with gentle hands, and fluffed the boy's ears, while Naruto chewed on the red head's tail affectionately.

They hadn't found out much, only that these boys had lived in the Logos labs for as long as they could remember really. They did get some rudimentary information on the organization though. It was called Akatsuki, and there were a few names they knew now, not that they connected to anything else they knew. They were just names, some with positions attached to the end. It was both fascinating and frustrating for Sakura, because this was an entirely new development in their mapping of the organization. They were definitely more of a threat than the group had thought in the beginning. She vowed to look into it further when she had the time, soon enough.

X

Neji walked back to their hotel room alone in the gritty dying light of dusk in the city. He'd meant to stay as long as Hinata did, and make sure she was safe, but he had other things to do, and the twittering girls were getting on his last nerve. Besides, his cousin had looked so happy there, among people her own age with whom she could just be friendly. She'd been groomed as the heir to the Hyuuga's dynasty from before she could walk, and she'd never really had actual friends for very long, and none of the stupid rich girls her parents liked her to visit with cared about any of the same things she did. Hinata was sweet that way.

Still, in the slowly darkening city, alone in the crowded street, Neji had to admit he was a bit lonely, maybe a bit envious of that. He'd never really had anyone he could call a real friend either, though he lacked them more out of a self imposed social isolation and dedication to his studies and his duties as a member of the second house than Hinata's forced shallow socialization.

He sighed as he entered the bullet lift, pressing the little neon 10 on the panel. Other people stepped into the scratched plexi elevator, but no one was going as high as him. He shifted uncomfortably, his eyes fixed onto his shoes. He didn't look up, not until the little chamber was empty and he was alone, though it wasn't long after that when the doors slid open again, to a considerably brighter, and better kept view. The streets this high were mostly just wide paved catwalks, straddling buildings and small areas of artificial greenery.

Neji shoved his hands into his pockets, fingering the elegant yet understated key chip in his pocket, the one that would let him back into his room. He could see the hotel from there, a classically styled segment of building suspended between two flashy dark glass office towers. It was a good hotel, but it wasn't like Hinata's parents would have let them get anything else. They wouldn't even have let Hinata go into the city if Neji hadn't promised to stay with her, protect her.

He gave a slight nod to the doorman as he entered, his footfalls muffled when he stepped into the lobby, the richly colored rubber composite flooring absorbing the shock of the noise in the echoing vat marble hall. He pressed the elevator button, and it took only seconds for one of the gleaming metal doors to slide open, a cheery automated female voice asking him what his room number was.

"507" He spoke clearly and quickly, stepping in and holding onto the little bar by the door. He took a deep breath as the door slid shut. He'd never liked these little elevators much, the space too small to be comfortable, he always got a little claustrophobic being in them for too long. Luckily the trip was quick, the elevator gliding quickly up the five floors, then sliding over, the door whirring open on the other side, leaving him staring at his hotel room door as soon as he turned around. The cheery mechanical voice returned then, reminding him to be careful stepping out, to make sure to gather all his personal effects, and wishing him a pleasant day.

X

Sasuke sat on a cushioned bench in the hotel lobby, and watched Neji step into the lift. He caught the room number Neji had said before stepping inside, and quickly scribbled a 507 into the margins of the little newsmagazine he'd been pretending to read. He'd picked it up on the way over, having seen a few too many old spy movies in his youth, thinking it would be an invaluable prop for following the boy to find out who it was he was involved with. Mostly he had just doodled in the margins though, not finding anything in the magazine at all interesting or important to read.

He decided quickly after he saw Neji that this spy shit was overrated, and not as baddass as he thought it would be. He sighed, folding the news magazine under his arm and heading for the front door. He'd find someone at the desk to bribe into calling him when the Hyuuga left. For now he was going to go get some breakfast.

X

Hinata was having more fun than she'd had in awhile. The girls were giggling in the small kitchen of the downtown compound. They were making breakfast, Sakura teaching her how to make omelets with the vegetables they grew upstairs. They had just gotten a delivery of milk, eggs, and vat meats from a farm outside of the city. Sakura and Ino had both worked there in their youths, and they still helped out when they needed it. Right now though, they were mostly just doing their rescue missions and such, spending their free time here, or working over at the animal rescue league shelter on the outskirts of the city.

They were going over later that day actually, and Hinata had jumped at their invitation to come with them. She had always wanted to do things like this, but on the Hyuuga compound, which was a good hour and a half by flight, there really wasn't anything she could do, and she wasn't allowed out of the compound without an escort.

She was grateful to Neji for agreeing to accompany her out here, even though he usually did whenever she asked him. She toyed with the idea of asking her parents to buy a house in the city when she returned. They could certainly afford it, hell she could probably afford it by herself, she had enough money in the bank at the moment. She just needed an excuse to stay here. Maybe she'd find a school or something she could attend, her parents had always said they wanted her to earn a university degree, after all she was supposed to take over the family businesses some day. She had no interest in it really, but she knew she'd be more of a figurehead leader than anything else, there would be other highly capable people to actually run things, and Neji would be there by her side, to help her with anything she actually had to do herself.

X

Naruto waited until the door was shut and the boy in green was gone to let out a sigh. In truth, he was kind of happy to be out of the white rooms and away from the crazy doctors, even if he did miss some of the people there. How could he not, really? They were the only people he'd ever known, they every since he was old enough to remember things. Still, it was exciting here, there were some windows, and he could see the street outside, see cars and things, and every once and awhile someone would walk by.

And the people were nice here, they gave him food and scratched behind his ears, and no one had tried to cut him, or do any weird tests like they would do at the labs. The first day one of them, the boy with pineapple hair, had taken some small samples, but that had been it, a needle and a skin scrape and that was it.

Still, he picked up some distrust from Gaara, who wasn't quite as at home here as Naruto was. In truth, Gaara sat in the corner most of the time, watching Naruto as the blond rocketed around the little room, looking at everything, and reading the magazines those girls had given them on the light tables. He was waiting for the catch here, waiting for the conditions for their change of hands to come around, because nothing at all in either of their lives had ever come without some sort of strings attached.

X

Sasuke had been sitting in the little café for hours now, when his phone buzzed sharply on his hip. He grabbed it up, flipping it open quickly. It was the Hotel desk, the woman who he'd bribed earlier, and it hadn't really taken that much money to do it either. She told him quickly, in a hushed voice, that the Hyuuga was leaving the building now, and would be outside shortly. Sasuke grunted a response, and tapped his credit chip onto the stud on the table, paying for his coffee and uneaten pastry. He stilled for a second before grabbing the sugary thing, still wrapped in it's paper napkin, and putting it carefully into the bag he carried.

He got outside just in time to see Neji's back disappearing towards the bullet lifts. He scowled, he might loose the boy there, he wouldn't know what floor Neji was going to unless he followed him and he damn well couldn't get into the same car as him, then he'd be found out and all would be lost.

He walked just close enough to see the number Neji pushed, and it gave him pause. The second level was kind of low down for someone like him to venture, but then again who knew who the Hyuuga could be working with here. Sasuke felt the adrenaline kick in as his heart thundered faster and faster. He felt like a small child, playing some sort of adventure video game, or a genuine spy. He slipped into the lift lines after Hyuuga, waiting until the boy's car left before pressing the button for the second level himself, squeezing into the elevator car.

It whooshed downwards, stopping at a couple odd floors to pick up and let off passengers. Sasuke was leaning against the side wall of the lift, his breath coming quickly as he drummed crossed fingers against the control panel at the front of the lift, hoping desperately that he wouldn't lose Neji's trail this way.

Then the doors slid open on the second level, and Sasuke stepped out, a little too quickly. He stumbled a little, catching himself before he fell, looking around for the Hyuuga. He let out a relieved sigh when he saw the boy walking off between two buildings, and he followed, trying to stay far enough behind not to be seen or heard.

X

Neji made his way through the second district solemnly. It was full of people at this hour, people bustling about their business, carrying baskets of things. There were little stalls set out on the sidewalk, some spilling out delicious smells, others sprawled with broken electronics and black market goods from out of town.

Neji felt a little bit more at ease down here, honestly, no one looked at him like they knew what he was supposed to be, like they had some expectations of him. Down here he was just some guy, he wasn't Neji Hyuuga, son of the second house. It was comforting, really. Still, he had places to go now, he had to go talk to Hinata and her new friends. He sighed again, pointing himself back towards the little compound he'd been at this morning.

Just when he was about to knock on the door, he got this feeling. He felt like there was someone watching him, like there were eyes boring into his back. He turned around quickly, looking over his shoulder, but he saw no one. Well, really he saw lots and lots of people, but it worked out the same in the end. There wasn't anyone he recognized there though, so he turned back around.

He knocked on the door, one sharp rap, then a pause and then two more, one after the other. He waited, all of a sudden worried he hadn't done it right, that no one would answer, that they'd leave and take Hinata with them. He was just about to try again, to do something else, when the door slid open, he stood there for a second, heart racing, just staring at it before he shook off the feeling and stepped inside.

X

Sasuke had been waylaid in the street, someone trying to sell him a slightly used set of steel knives, not quite speaking the language very well. He'd caught up though, just in time to see Neji disappear into a nondescript little door, tucked into a short building shoved into the space between two others, where there once might have been a small park or some such thing. Sasuke would have walked right past it if he hadn't seen Neji disappear into it.

He walked forwards, crossing the street quickly, but the door was tightly closed by then. Sasuke swore under his breath. He looked in the window, but he saw nothing, the curtains were closed tightly inside. Sasuke took a step back, looking round frantically for some other way to make sure this was the place, even though the knowledge that this was indeed the right place twisted in his stomach.

He couldn't let this chance slip through his fingers, he needed to do this right. If he fucked this up now, he could never live it down, he could never be the person his brother could admire, a person his brother could love.

He ran around to the next corner, looking back and forth. The building went down to the first level, down three floors from here, he could see it between the seams in the sidewalks. He sprinted to the elevators, counting his steps carefully, and going down one level, fast as he could get the thing to go. The machinery of the elevator hummed and clanked down that one floor.

The doors hissed open, and Sasuke ran out, not looking around, not paying attention to anything but getting back to that building. He'd never been to the first level, it was certainly darker down here than it had been up higher, dramatically darker than even one level above. He didn't really notice though, he was on a mission.

He reached the building, the familiar shade of it's paint showing, even in the dark. He ran to the windows down there, taking in the weird glowing of the light from within, and got a vague impression of a room, the paint peeling on the walls, stacked to the ceiling with boxes, each labeled in impeccable, even handwriting in a language he didn't recognize.

That was the last image he saw, he didn't hear the figure sneaking up behind him, because the figure didn't want to be heard. The figure came only close enough to make sure of Sasuke's intentions, but when his pale hand reached for the latch on the window, a hand descended hard on the back of his head in a rush of fierce and sudden movement. He didn't see the flash of green, or the stern face looking down at him, he only saw darkness.

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A/N: again, josh helped some, it's unbetad. im still in a bad mood so thats all im saying.


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