Inevitable
Chapter 11

"For today's training exercise, you will follow Kakashiaround for an hour without being detected. Every time he notices you is another'hour' in my genjutsu after," Itachi instructed. Amejisuto nodded and tookoff, concealing her chakra once she saw her ex-leader. He went into a bookstore and came out a few minutes later with yet another book from the Icha-Ichaseries. Next, he went to the store, buying a few bags of groceries that went towaste when he dropped them and ran over to a poster.

"ICHA-ICHA TACTICS IS BEING MADE INTO A MOVIE!" heyelled happily, skipping oddly down the streets to his house, forgetting aboutthe food he had bought. The Ishi hid in the trees as she followed the silver-hairedJonin across the town, stopping at his house. "Hey Ameji, what are youdoing up there?" he asked, looking quizzingly up at her. She silentlycursed. She had been distracted by a squirrel.

"Well, you caught me,” she mumbled, hopping out of thetree. "Thanks a lot, Kakashi. I have to spend an hour in Itachi's genjutsunow."

Kakashi smirked. "I bet he'll replace a reason to excuseyou from that punishment, or at least give you the least horrible jutsu he hasstored."

"True, he has never really punished me and I've beenhis student for over three months," she agreed.

"And I have a pretty good idea of why," thecopy-nin winked. Or blinked. It was hard to tell when his headband was alwayscovering his transplanted sharingan eye.

"I probably know what you're thinking, and don't evengo there. There is no way that someone like him likes me like that. Sakura and my cousin already teased me aboutthat."

"Is it too much pressure? Too awkward to thinkabout?"

"No, nothing like that," the Ishi sighed, hopinghe would take the hint and stop intruding on her personal thoughts.

"Don't you like him?" she felt like she was being smotheredin questions, making her uncomfortable.

"I..."

"Or are you scared of what might happen if he everactually said it?"

"..."

"So I see you got caught," Itachi interrupted,coming into the clearing from the forest and saving his student from curling upin a ball and trying to hide from the probing questions. He noticed heruneasiness and glared at Kakashi. "What did you say to her?"

"Oh nothing, just trying to dig into her mind,"the Jonin shrugged half-heartedly before walking off.

"Are you alright?" Itachi looked down atAmejisuto.

"Yah, but I feel like I was just interrogated byIbiki," she murmured.

"Well, since you're not at your best in the mentalstate, I won't use my jutsu-"

"No, please do it. I got caught. If it was a realmission, my punishment might be death," she pleaded. The ANBU member sighedin defeat. He was hoping he would never have to use such a jutsu on her. Heactivated his sharingan. "Look into my eyes," he ordered, regretting evenconsidering using the tsukuyomi as a punishment. She gazed into his eyes, gottrapped in the jutsu, whimpered, and collapsed after a second.

Inside the jutsu, the sky turned red and the scenery wasdifferent shades of black and white. She was tied up to a pole and people shedidn't know were surrounding her, asking terrible questions and trying to diginto her mind, making her feel exposed and unprotected. She was tempted to cryout for Itachi and was shocked when she realised that she came to rely on himtoo much in the past three months.

Sure, she knew he would probably be there for her for awhile, but what about when the training was over? Would she be lost withouthim? Had she gotten too used to relying on him to be by her side? The peoplekept taunting her and she couldn't move. An hour of it was terrible. She wantedto cry but found that she had no tears. 'Thiswouldn't be as bad as getting killed or physical torture,' she thought tokeep her sanity as stable as she could.

The genjutsu world faded away to black. Her eyes flickeredopen and her room came in focus, and so did the man who sent her into thejutsu. He was sitting over her while she was tucked in her bed. "Was ittoo much?” he looked very concerned.

"I pity those who get caught in worse ones and for morethan an hour," she chuckled weakly.

"It's only an illusion. In reality, it's only one secondbefore you collapse. Some people get trapped for several hours," heinformed.

"Well you Uchihas are famous for genjutsu, so I'm nottoo surprised. How long have I been out?"

"Only about twenty minutes. This one time, I wassparring with Sasuke and trapped him in there for over a day. It took himalmost a week to wake up," Itachi shook his head, disappointed in himselffor being so harsh. There were a few minutes of silence before the Ishi spoke.

"So is there any more training today?"

"No, your mind and body need to rest. You're not usedto that jutsu, and it takes time to recover," Itachi got up and Amejisutoslid out of the bed, wobbling slightly. The raven held out his arm andstabilised her. She clutched onto his arm, feeling like a helpless child whowas still learning to walk. They managed to get to the back garden for somepeace and quiet. And tea.

"Itachi, why are you just sitting around? You've beenslacking off on your duties as a sensei," Fugaku interrupted their resttime.

"I'm sorry, Lord Fugaku, it's my fault. I'll get backto learning right away," Amejisuto tried to get up but fell over. TheUchiha leader looked slightly worried, which was unusual due to hisnormally-stoic composure.

"It was her first time in the tsukuyomi," his son explained.

"How long did youput her in for?"

"Only anhour."

"And this was herfist time? Itachi, training doesn't do much without punishment when somethinggoes wrong," Fugaku said in a disappointed tone. "You're being toonice."

"Kurenai-senseidoesn't punish her students much either," Amejisuto defended. "AndKiba, Hinata and Shino have turned into great ninja." She crawled back onthe porch weakly.

"Yes, well theUchiha techniques of teaching are different."

"Yes, father, butshe has to rest today. Her chakra drained quite a bit from trying to escape thegenjutsu," Itachi stated. His father nodded and grunted before walkingoff. The younger Uchiha turned to his student. "Now, consider these firstthree months as just a warm up. You’ve mastered the jutsu you showed me whenyou first got here; you're ready to take on some high level Uchiha jutsu."

The brunette smiledand clenched her face in determination. "Give me all ya got!"

"Don't get too hot-blooded," Itachi smirked."You don't want to end up like Lee and Guy-sensei."

"Ew! I'd rathergo in the tsukuyomi than be like them. Their brows are so huge and fuzzythey're almost alive!!"

They both laughed andkept sipping tea while enjoying the silence and beauty of the garden.

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"There's nowhere left to run, two-tails," Hidansmirked in victory. A blonde woman withlong hair in a braid was backed into a corner, panting from running andfighting for so long. Her blue clothes matched the liquid that started to coverher as she transformed into a blue two-tailed leopard.

"You will never capture me! I will fight and win forKirigakure!" She growled.

"Don't count on it," Kakuzu stepped out of theshadows of the sewer they were in, releasing a bunch of wires and effectively restrainingthe girl. Hidan stepped forward and cut her shallowly with his scythe, lickingher blood off of his weapon. His skin turned black with white shadows, like adiscolored skeleton, and he drew a triangle out of his own blood, stepping inthe middle. The two-tails cloak was gone, leaving a frustrated blonde back inhuman form.

The albino stabbed himself in the gut, making the woman cryout and lean over in pain. Whatever the Jashinist did to himself, she would getthe same injury. He kept adding cuts and blows until she was half dead andcouldn't move before releasing his jutsu and becoming bored again. "I wantto sacrifice her. It's been a while," he whined, knowing he couldn’t haveher.

"We need her alive for the extraction and she will bedead after. You can stay behind and replace a suitable candidate, but make sure tonot spend any money on anything," Kakuzu said, picking up the jinchurikiand carrying her over his shoulder. "Pain won't be happy if you're latethough, so hurry up."

They left the sewer and split up. The immortal man went intothe city to replace someone to sacrifice for his god, Jashin, and the oldmoney-obsessed man went straight to the hideout. Once he got there, he foundmost of the members gathered in the main meeting room. "Where's Hidan?"‘Tobi’ chirped.

"He's doing a stupid ritual for his stupid god again,right?" Kisame snickered.

"It's a good thing he can't die, otherwise I would'vekilled him by now," Kakuzu grumbled.

"Well he can be informed of this when he getshere," Pain said. "I have an announcement about the plan to captureItachi Uchiha." He paused for dramatic effect but ended up getting lost inthought. Konan nudged him after a while, making him straighten up. "I willlet Zetsu explain what he has learned first."

The odd plant-man came out of the ground dramatically whilethe other members stayed unimpressed. He did that all the time, making themwonder if he even had legs. The dark half spoke first. "Itachi Uchiha is kind,wise, and a prodigy, making him one of the most powerful ninja in history dueto his already advanced clan. He is also the next leader of the Uchihas, so heis respected and admired. He is also one whose disappearance would make a hugeimpact due to these factors.

Ever since he joined ANBU at eleven years of age, I had beenordered to observe him and replace out his weaknesses. At first I thought it wouldbe his clan or his title, but he views his village a home, rather than just hisclan, unlike other Uchihas, meaning if his clan was murdered, he would stillstay.

I then thought his weakness would be his brother, Sasuke,who adored him so much, but if something happened to Sasuke, his whole clanwould chip in in helping. I got frustrated and almost gave up on my mission, butthen I noticed something odd. There were two people who weren't his superiorsthat he couldn't say 'no' to. His cherished brother and his current apprentice,Amejisuto Ishi."

"I thought that she had only just asked him to be hersensei. They had a history?" Hidan asked.

"Whoa! When did you get here, yeah?" Deidaraasked.

"Oh, right when the plant freak stated talking. Icouldn't replace any good candidates in that town."

"Anyways, please continue Zetsu," Konan said.White Zetsu spoke next.

"Amejisuto and Sasuke were friends in pre-school andthe academy. Since they hung out a lot, Itachi was usually there to supervise.I watched as Itachi stopped being a chaperone and started spending time withthem and not just because of his brother, whom he could never say no to ever sincehe was born. I noticed that whenever the young Ishi would ask something of him,he did it, even if it was something that made him look ridiculous, ranging frompiggy-back rides to taking her and Sasuke for snacks.

Over time, they all separated. She was assigned to TeamFour, Sasuke was in Team Seven, and Itachi spent his time doing month-longmissions. He even started to distance himself from Sasuke, always makingexcuses when he asked Itachi to teach him new things, but on the rare occasionsthat Amejisuto still asked him for something, he wouldn't hesitate to say yes. Irecently realised that he has loved her for almost ten years, and is currently in love with her. Unfortunately, it'saffecting her training, though he's been called out on being too nice, so he isprobably going to train her harder."

Pain stepped forward. "So basically, she is hisgreatest weakness. Itachi would rather the village be destroyed than anythingto happen to her. Our plan is to wait until she is unguarded and weak after an intensetraining session and capture her. She will be held here as our prisoner and theonly way to keep her safe would be for him to join the Akatsuki."