Kisame watched the kid standing on a dead branch, drifting slowly toward him.
At first, he froze.
Then.
"Hahahaha!"
An unbearably grating laugh, like nails scraping glass.
Burst from his wide, gill-slit mouth.
"Mr. Itachi."
Kisame's pupilless, dead-fish eyes fixed on Sen.
A few red veins even crept across the whites in his excitement.
"Look at this kid. Has he lost his mind?"
"That old bastard Orochimaru was driven off by an idiot like this, who doesn't know his own limits?"
Itachi stood beside him.
His scarlet Mangekyō Sharingan remained utterly emotionless.
The shadow beneath his bamboo hat concealed his expression.
He did not answer.
Only his fingers, tucked inside his sleeve, curled ever so slightly.
Kisame lowered Samehada from his shoulder.
Whoosh!
He roughly grabbed the bandages wrapped around the sword's hilt.
And yanked hard.
Large strips of yellowed bandages, reeking of dead fish and rotten shrimp.
Unraveled instantly and fell into the river.
Revealing the ninja blade's true form.
It was a sword.
A massive blade covered in dark blue barbs as sharp as shark scales.
Most disgusting of all.
A mouth full of sharp teeth split open at the tip of the blade!
That mouth kept opening and closing.
It even.
Click, click.
Made strange sounds like bones being chewed.
It looked.
Like a living, ravenous monster.
"Kid."
Kisame licked his thick lips.
An exceptionally cruel grin spread across his blue-green face.
"According to that fellow from Absolute's intel, you've got a monster's worth of chakra?"
"You even beat that sandy bastard One-Tail to a pulp?"
Kisame rubbed his hands in excitement, the webbing making wet sounds against the hilt.
"That's wonderful!"
"You know."
Kisame slammed Samehada against the water's surface.
Sending up a splash of murky water mixed with green sludge.
"What my Samehada likes most."