In Heat

Naruto’s eyes fluttered open as warm sunlight washed over his body from the large stained glass window. His entire body was warm and comfortable. He lay there for a few minutes as the memories of what had happened, six hours ago, washed over his mind. Naruto slowly turned his tired eyes to the right to gaze upon the beautiful face of his loved one, only to find he wasn’t there. Naruto wiped the sleep from his eyes and pushed himself up to his knees and looked around the room.


He expected it to be just as it had been when he had first woken up. Naruto scanned the room and saw something new. At the left side of the bed was a small dark wood table with some folded up cloths and a note. Naruto crawled across the bed to the table and picked up the note. Naruto read the note out loud;

My Little Kitsune,
I had some business I needed to take care of. Here are some clothes for you to wear. You are free to explore the base but not leave it. I will be back as soon as I can. Deidara will escort you around in my absence.
Your loving mate,


Itachi


Naruto put the note down and grabbed the clothes Itachi had laid out for him. He unfolded them and placed them on the bed so he could have a better look at them. There was a pair of black boxers with red dragons on them. Naruto quickly started putting them on just in case someone, other than Itachi, came barging in.

When the boxers were halfway up his legs the two large marble doors swung open and someone with an Akatsuki robe, bright blond hair, and light green eyes walked into the room. Naruto turned to see; whom he guessed was Deidara, standing in the doorway. They stared at each other for a moment before Deidara realized what he was looking at. Deidara’s face turned slightly red as he gazed upon Naruto’s naked body before turning around.


“Sorry. Please hurry up, I don’t want to sit out here all day hn,” he said as he left the room and closed the doors behind him.
Naruto could feel himself beginning to blush. He quickly hoisted up the boxers and turned back to his clothes. All than was left were a pair of pants that were dark forest green and crimson lines ran along the seams. The pants came with a black leather belt, white socks, and a pair of black sandals. Naruto quickly put on the rest of the clothes and walked over to the door.

He opened it and looked down the hall, sulking against the wall was Deidara. Naruto slowly walked over to him. Deidara looked up at him and they stared at each other for a minute. Deidara slowly stood up and looked Naruto over.
“Why don’t you have a shirt on hn?” Deidara asked staring at Naruto’s flawless chest.
“Itachi didn’t give me one,” Naruto replied, now wishing he had a shirt.
“Here,” Deidara reached into his robe and pulled out a ninja headband, “Itachi wanted me to give you this hn,” He handed the headband to Naruto.

He knew from the first sight that it was his headband. All of the little nicks and scratches were where he remembered them to be. Naruto gripped his headband with all of his might as the memories of all of the neglect, abuse, and pain came flooding back into his mind. He took the headband and put it on his forehead, tying it as tightly as possible before looking back at Deidara.


“So, how about that tour?” Naruto asked. Deidara nodded and started walking down the hall, Naruto following close behind him.
They walked down the long hallway in silence. The hallway had no windows like in the bedroom. The only light came from the torches hanging on the walls. It almost seemed like a completely different place without any sunlight. The walls were made of onyx. The dark stone made their long shadows seem almost camouflaged against the walls. The hallway had a cold temperature, which caused him to shiver. They eventually came to a large circular structure with many other hallways branching off of it. Naruto walked into the center and counted all of the hallways. There were twenty-six.


“Wow this is a lot of hallways,” Naruto said looking around.
“We wouldn’t want our enemies finding their way around here easily, now would we hn?” Deidara asked as he moved towards one of the hallways. Naruto followed down the dark hallway quietly.
They continued down the hallway, taking, what Naruto saw as, random turns and going up random stairways. He tried to memorize what hallways they turned down but there were so many he gave up. Eventually they came to a dark wooden door. Deidara opened it and ushered Naruto through. Naruto walked through the doorway and found himself in that looked like a foyer of a castle.

“Where are we?” Naruto asked in awe.
“This is one of our side bases. We don’t use it much but we thought it would safe to bring you here so if Konoha found us we would be safe hn.” Deidara said.
“So where were we before?”
“Beneath the castle. That’s where everyone’s rooms are when they stay here.”
“Cool,” Naruto said.
“Hey Deidara-senpai!” Someone cried out. Naruto and Deidara looked to their right and running towards them waving his hand was Tobi. Deidara groaned as Tobi ran up to him.
“You showing Itachi’s pet around?” Tobi asked looking at Naruto. Tobi’s visible eye widened when he saw Naruto’s neck.
“What happened to your neck?” Tobi asked pointing at Naruto’s scar Itachi had made.
“Uh…nothing!” Naruto yelled covering it with his hand.
“It looks like you got bit,” Tobi teased.
“It’s none of your business!” Naruto yelled.
“Oooo…defensive aren’t we?” Tobi said
“Shut up!” Naruto yelled.
“Tobi stop teasing Itachi’s mate hn,” Deidara said.
“Mate?” Tobi asked shocked.
“How did you know?” Naruto asked.
“Itachi’s not the only one who studied up on fox mating rituals,” Deidara said with a wink.
“Itachi-senpai and Naruto sittin’ in a bush, up down up down, push push push!”


Naruto didn’t want to hear the rest of the rhyme so he covered his fox ears and ran away from Deidara and Tobi. Naruto ran up the stairs to his left and down the hall. Once he was sure he was alone before he stopped and uncovered his ears. Naruto looked around, trying to find out where to go next. He had ditched his tour guide and now had no idea where he was. Naruto was just about to go back when he smelled something. Naruto knew that smell anywhere.

“RAMEN!” He exclaimed and followed the smell of food. Naruto dashed down the hallway until he came to the source of the smell. The smell was coming from behind a pair of wooden double doors. He threw open the door and walked inside.
The room was huge. The walls were made of marble and the floor was onyx. Fifteen long wooden tabled were placed in three even rows. Two wooden benches the same length as the tables were placed on each side of the tables. At the opposite end of the room was a buffet sitting against the wall. There were only three other people in the room with Naruto. One was a guy who looked like he had a Venus fly trap on his head. The second one was three tables away from flytrap head. The other person had silver slicked back hair, and looked like all he was wearing was his Akatsuki cloak. Also he had a large three bladed scythe next to him. *Better not sit by him,* Naruto thought.


The last person Naruto couldn’t really see. Their Akatsuki cloak was on and they also wore their sunhat, which hid their face. Naruto shrugged and made his way to the buffet.
The buffet was set up where a person first grabs a blood red plastic tray and napkins. From there the large array of food is presented for the chooser. Naruto slid his trey down the metal buffet as he scanned the assortment of food, looking for the one food he had to have. He spotted the ramen down near the end of the buffet. He ran over to it, sliding his tray across the buffet with him. He stopped right in front of the ramen selection and took a look. There was chicken, beef, pork, shrimp, teriyaki, and…vegetarian. Naruto stared at the vegetarian ramen for a few seconds.

“Vegetarian is the stupidest flavor ever. Who can eat that crap?” Naruto asked himself as he took the chicken and teriyaki flavored ramen and moved down the buffet. At the end were small cartons of milk and the eating utensils. Naruto grabbed two cartons of milk, moved to the utensils and stopped dead in his tracks.
Naruto stared at the selection of utensils before him. There were three bins sitting at the every end of the buffet. The first one had plastic forks, the second held plastic spoons, and the last one contained plastic knives. Naruto just stood there for a minute.

“Why are there plastic and no chop sticks?” Naruto asked out loud.
“Because Deidara’s hands kept eating the metal silverware trying to get the clay out of them.” Naruto turned to see the Akatsuki member who had his face hidden standing behind him.
“So why no chop sticks?” Naruto asked.
“Kakuzu says they’re too expensive. So we buy the cheap plastic crappy silverware.” Naruto just stared at the unknown person for a few seconds. From the sound of his voice he sounded like a man. Naruto turned and grabbed one of each plastic utensil and went to a table. Naruto opened his ramen cups, steam erupted form them, the smell making his mouth water. Naruto took the teriyaki ramen cup and poured it into the chicken ramen and mixed it together with the plastic spoon.
Once it was all mixed up, he took the fork and spoon, turned them upside down, and used the handles like chopsticks. Naruto greedily slurped up the ramen, enjoying the taste of the chicken teriyaki ramen he made.

Naruto was about half way done with his ramen when he heard something behind him. Naruto quickly grabbed his tray and spun around on the bench. Naruto held up the tray just in time. Eight kunai knives stuck into the tray. Naruto took the tray and threw it at the guy who had obviously thrown the kunai. Naruto grabbed the first thing his hand felt on the table and ran at the man. The man pulled out another kunai and used it to slash the tray, sending it sprawling across the floor. What he didn’t count on was Naruto following close behind the tray. Naruto took his weapon and stabbed the man in the ribs, under his outstretched arm he had just used to deflect the tray.
Naruto just stood there looking up at the man, the weapon still held firmly at the man’s ribs.


“You do realize that if that knife had not been plastic I would be dead right now,” the man said as he stepped away from Naruto. Naruto looked at his hand and there was the plastic knife he had grabbed. The blade was now bend and cracked.
“Why did you try to kill me?” Naruto asked.
“I didn’t try to kill you, I was teaching you to never turn your back to a potential enemy.”
“What’s the difference?” Naruto asked, clearly annoyed.
“You standing before me talking, or you laying in a puddle of your own blood, dead.” The man stated.
“Oh…good point,” Naruto said. This guy scared him. He talked like Naruto being dead wasn’t that big of a deal.
“Come with me,” the man stated and started walking towards the exit.

Naruto didn’t want to make the man angry so he followed with no complaints. The man led Naruto down another series of hallways until they reached what looked like a throne room. Naruto looked around in awe of the sparking room. Gold torches hung on the walls giving light and warmth to the room. A dazzling red carpet led from the door to the sparkling gold and diamond-encrusted throne. Tall marble pillars reached up the roof. The man walked over to the throne and sat down. Naruto walked up to him and just stood there.


“Do you know who I am?” the man asked. Naruto raised an eyebrow.
“No I don’t. I can’t see your face. How could I know you?”
“I am the leader of Akatsuki,” the man said.
“You are?” Naruto tilted his head to the side. He had to admit he pictured the leader of the deadly organization to be taller.
“I am also…” the man’s sentence trailed off as he reached up and removed his sunhat. Naruto’s eyes widened and he stepped back as he gazed upon the face of the Akatsuki leader.

“You Bastard!” Naruto yelled as he lunged at the man sitting on the throne.