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Title: 1117
Author: Evandar (yamievandar / hikarievandar)
Fandom: Naruto
Rating: T - NC-17
Pairings: established Kakuzu/Hidan, future Kisame/Itachi and Sasori/Deidara
Genre: Humour
Warnings: AU, yaoi, swearing, details of the hospitality industryseriously, it needs a warning, and probably OOCness.
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto and I am making no profit from this story.
Summary: Backpacking through Cloud, Itachi runs out of money and runs out of luck. He ends up working for accommodation in a hostel, surrounded by crazy people and flagging hygiene standards. Good lord.
AN: So, this is basically my life - the anecdotes, the insanity, the situation. Obviously, I'm not using real names and obviously it's been put into a fanfic format and I'll be trying to keep people in character as much as possible. I just need the therapy.
“Do you know if you need someone to work for accommodation?”
Itachi shifts awkwardly under the receptionist’s gaze. The man looks horribly bored. Bored to a level previously undiscovered by man. His mismatched eyes are half closed, as if he’s fighting off sleep. A book with a lewd, bright orange cover rests next to his mouse mat.
He hums noncommittally and runs his fingers through his spiky silver hair. “Not my area,” he says. “But the housekeepers would know.” His gaze drifts back from Itachi to his computer. He clicks on something. “They’ve all gone home, though. I can give you a room for the night and then you can talk to them in the morning.”
“Okay,” Itachi says. He swallows. “Whatever’s cheapest.”
It’s forty dollars, including the key deposit. He’s breaking into his last two hundred dollars. The thought makes him want to curl up in a ball and weep, but he hands the money over without so much as a wince. Uchiha stoicism is good for something, it seems.
The receptionist slides a key over the desk. “Check out’s at ten. Get up early if you want to talk to the housekeepers.”
Itachi shoulders his backpack once more and heads to the lifts.
The room he’s been given is a four bed dorm roughly the size of a box. There’s no window, and there’s a man lying in one of the bottom bunks snoring loudly. It smells faintly of BO and beer and Itachi’s nose wrinkles. He drops his stuff in a corner and climbs up into one of the unclaimed top bunks. It’s no worse than most of the places he’s stayed in on his travels, and sleep is easy to find. Just before he drops off, he pulls his phone from his pocket and sets his alarm for early the next morning.
…
When it comes, the next morning is a whirlwind of activity. He arrives in housekeeping to find people stacking bundles of crisp sheets and pillowcases in cages and arranging vacuums and cleaning sprays on trolleys. He dodges past a tall boy with blue skin and taps on the office door.
“What?” The head housekeeper is a fierce looking woman with faint lines around her eyes and a decidedly unpleasant expression.
“I want to sign up?” Itachi replies. It comes out as more of a question than anything else. Itachi’s not sure if this is such a good idea after all, but he doesn’t have much of a choice. He won’t be able to afford food if he doesn’t start making money soon, and saving money on accommodation is the best plan he’s got so far.
The woman’s expression changes in an instant. “No problem, doll,” she says. “Come in. You staying here?”
“Yes, but I have to check out today.”
“Okay, okay, I’ll sign you up and then you can grab your bag and take it down to the dorm.”
She’s filling in a form she’s pulled from somewhere. Itachi tilts his head to look over her shoulder. It’s his contract. “Then if you ask reception for a pass key to the tenth floor we’ll get you started today, alright doll?”
“Uh.” She said it all very quickly and Itachi feels somewhat at a loss. She takes his non-answer as an affirmative and hands him the contract.
“We’ll need a copy of your passport and your work visa, but we can sort that out after your shift.” She’s still talking, and Itachi tries to listen and read the contract at the same time. He’s got the feeling that this ‘meeting’ is about to end. “So if you sign at the end, we’ll be done.”
A pen is shoved into his hand. He turns to the last page and signs. “Can I take a copy to read over?” he asks.
“You won’t need it, doll. Come on, let’s take you to reception.”
The receptionist is different from the one last night, but equally bored-looking. She – Itachi presumes she’s female, though it looks like she’s going for the androgynous look – has cropped black hair with long bangs falling over one side of her face and slanted pale blue eyes. There’s a queue of backpackers in front of her, their backpacks and their pillowcases in hand, and they chatter in a variety of dialects. 1 But the housekeeper leads them right to the front.
“We need a key for eleven-seventeen,” she says. “This one’s joining up. We’ll sort his bond out later, right?”
“Sure,” the receptionist says. She doesn’t even look in Itachi’s direction as she gives him a new key. “See you later.”
The housekeeper slaps Itachi on the shoulder, making him jerk forward under the sudden contact. The woman hits hard. “Go take your stuff down to the room, and then head to level ten, okay? Utakata will give you a key for the lift when you’re ready. You’ll be working until one.”
He presumes Utakata is the receptionist. He nods. “Okay.”
“Good to have you, doll.” The housekeeper turns, then, and walks off, leaving Itachi staring after her. He feels like he’s just been dropped into an alternate reality.
“I’d hurry up if I were you,” Utakata says from behind him. He looks at her. She’s in the process of tossing a pillowcase over her shoulder and into a laundry bin. She fixes him a look. “They don’t like it when you’re late.”
“But I just signed up.”
“You think that matters?” She pulls twenty dollars out of the cash drawer. “There’s your key deposit back,” she says to the backpacker she’s serving. “Have a good one.” She looks back at Itachi. “Seriously, what are you waiting for?”
He leaves.
…
Room eleven-seventeen is dark. The shadows of four bunk beds loom at him out of the darkness. Itachi reaches for the light switch, but hesitates. The bottom bunk opposite the door, mostly hidden by a curtain made out of a sheet, has an arm sticking out of it. Someone’s in, and they’re asleep. Itachi hates waking people up, but he has no idea which beds are free. He flicks the switch.
The lights flicker then come on fully. There’s a groan from the bed and the arm retracts. The sheet twitches, then draws aside, and a bloodshot pink eye glares out at him.
“Uh,” Itachi says. He hadn’t known people could have pink eyes. “Which beds are free?”
There’s another groan. The eye disappears. Then the arm re-emerges and points. The bed above itself and the top bunk in the corner furthest from the door.
“Thanks,” Itachi says.
“S’fine,” comes the muffled reply. “Now turn the fucking light off.”
Itachi obeys and heads for the bed in the corner. He tosses his pack up onto it and turns to go.
There’s a sinking feeling in his stomach telling him that he may have made a bad decision at some point this morning.
…
He relates his story to the blue-skinned guy he ends up working with on the tenth floor. They’re paired up so Itachi can learn how to do hospital corners. He catches on in about five seconds. It’s not rocket science.
His story’s not much of one either, but Kisame sniggers appreciatively. “Me too,” he says, when Itachi tells him about the contract. “I don’t know if any of us have read it.”
It’s mildly reassuring. At least Itachi isn’t alone in not knowing what he’s signed up for.“I think I woke someone up,” he says as he tucks in the second sheet.
“Pale guy?” Kisame asks.
Itachi shrugs. The arm had been pale. Very pale, come to think of it; he’d been able to see the blue lines of the other boy’s veins. “He had pink eyes,” he says.
“That’s Hidan,” Kisame says. “He’s been here forever. He does the night shift.”
“There’s a night shift?” He can’t remember if it was mentioned at all.
“There’s four different shifts,” Kisame explains. He picks the duvet up off the chair he’d tossed it on while stripping the bed and throws it on to the newly made one. “Pull that end down and tuck it under. Yeah, like that. There’s the six to ten shift – Sasori does that, then there’s this one: nine to one. There’s an afternoon shift as well – Pein and Konan, they’re a couple, are on that one. I think it’s half one to half five?” He shrugs. “Then there’s the nights. That’s Hidan and Kakuzu’s job.”
“Oh,” Itachi says.
“Most people get shoved onto this one because of the amount of beds we have to make.”
“Right.” There’s something bothering him. “Do we ever change the duvets?”
“Not unless someone complains, or if someone’s wet the bed, shat themselves, thrown up, or died.”
Itachi looks up at him, wide-eyed. “That happens?”
“Not so much with the death,” Kisame says. “But everything else…” He shrugs. “The others have some stories. I’ve only been here for a week. Found a bottle of piss in the fridge on my first day, though.”
A shudder of revulsion makes its way down Itachi’s spine. “Why?” he asks. “I mean, why would anyone -?”
They move onto the next bed – a top bunk. “Who knows?” Kisame replies. “It’s probably better not to ask. I mean, it’s a bottle of piss in the fridge. Would you really want to know the answer?”
1.This is my personal bugbear about the Naruto-verse. All these different countries with different histories, geographies, and (probably) customs all seem to have the same language and culture in the manga/anime. That…wouldn’t happen. Not in real life. So, in accordance with my headcannon, dialect and customs will vary between characters from the different countries.
Author: Evandar (yamievandar / hikarievandar)
Fandom: Naruto
Rating: T - NC-17
Pairings: established Kakuzu/Hidan, future Kisame/Itachi and Sasori/Deidara
Genre: Humour
Warnings: AU, yaoi, swearing, details of the hospitality industry
Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto and I am making no profit from this story.
Summary: Backpacking through Cloud, Itachi runs out of money and runs out of luck. He ends up working for accommodation in a hostel, surrounded by crazy people and flagging hygiene standards. Good lord.
AN: So, this is basically my life - the anecdotes, the insanity, the situation. Obviously, I'm not using real names and obviously it's been put into a fanfic format and I'll be trying to keep people in character as much as possible. I just need the therapy.
“Do you know if you need someone to work for accommodation?”
Itachi shifts awkwardly under the receptionist’s gaze. The man looks horribly bored. Bored to a level previously undiscovered by man. His mismatched eyes are half closed, as if he’s fighting off sleep. A book with a lewd, bright orange cover rests next to his mouse mat.
He hums noncommittally and runs his fingers through his spiky silver hair. “Not my area,” he says. “But the housekeepers would know.” His gaze drifts back from Itachi to his computer. He clicks on something. “They’ve all gone home, though. I can give you a room for the night and then you can talk to them in the morning.”
“Okay,” Itachi says. He swallows. “Whatever’s cheapest.”
It’s forty dollars, including the key deposit. He’s breaking into his last two hundred dollars. The thought makes him want to curl up in a ball and weep, but he hands the money over without so much as a wince. Uchiha stoicism is good for something, it seems.
The receptionist slides a key over the desk. “Check out’s at ten. Get up early if you want to talk to the housekeepers.”
Itachi shoulders his backpack once more and heads to the lifts.
The room he’s been given is a four bed dorm roughly the size of a box. There’s no window, and there’s a man lying in one of the bottom bunks snoring loudly. It smells faintly of BO and beer and Itachi’s nose wrinkles. He drops his stuff in a corner and climbs up into one of the unclaimed top bunks. It’s no worse than most of the places he’s stayed in on his travels, and sleep is easy to find. Just before he drops off, he pulls his phone from his pocket and sets his alarm for early the next morning.
…
When it comes, the next morning is a whirlwind of activity. He arrives in housekeeping to find people stacking bundles of crisp sheets and pillowcases in cages and arranging vacuums and cleaning sprays on trolleys. He dodges past a tall boy with blue skin and taps on the office door.
“What?” The head housekeeper is a fierce looking woman with faint lines around her eyes and a decidedly unpleasant expression.
“I want to sign up?” Itachi replies. It comes out as more of a question than anything else. Itachi’s not sure if this is such a good idea after all, but he doesn’t have much of a choice. He won’t be able to afford food if he doesn’t start making money soon, and saving money on accommodation is the best plan he’s got so far.
The woman’s expression changes in an instant. “No problem, doll,” she says. “Come in. You staying here?”
“Yes, but I have to check out today.”
“Okay, okay, I’ll sign you up and then you can grab your bag and take it down to the dorm.”
She’s filling in a form she’s pulled from somewhere. Itachi tilts his head to look over her shoulder. It’s his contract. “Then if you ask reception for a pass key to the tenth floor we’ll get you started today, alright doll?”
“Uh.” She said it all very quickly and Itachi feels somewhat at a loss. She takes his non-answer as an affirmative and hands him the contract.
“We’ll need a copy of your passport and your work visa, but we can sort that out after your shift.” She’s still talking, and Itachi tries to listen and read the contract at the same time. He’s got the feeling that this ‘meeting’ is about to end. “So if you sign at the end, we’ll be done.”
A pen is shoved into his hand. He turns to the last page and signs. “Can I take a copy to read over?” he asks.
“You won’t need it, doll. Come on, let’s take you to reception.”
The receptionist is different from the one last night, but equally bored-looking. She – Itachi presumes she’s female, though it looks like she’s going for the androgynous look – has cropped black hair with long bangs falling over one side of her face and slanted pale blue eyes. There’s a queue of backpackers in front of her, their backpacks and their pillowcases in hand, and they chatter in a variety of dialects. 1 But the housekeeper leads them right to the front.
“We need a key for eleven-seventeen,” she says. “This one’s joining up. We’ll sort his bond out later, right?”
“Sure,” the receptionist says. She doesn’t even look in Itachi’s direction as she gives him a new key. “See you later.”
The housekeeper slaps Itachi on the shoulder, making him jerk forward under the sudden contact. The woman hits hard. “Go take your stuff down to the room, and then head to level ten, okay? Utakata will give you a key for the lift when you’re ready. You’ll be working until one.”
He presumes Utakata is the receptionist. He nods. “Okay.”
“Good to have you, doll.” The housekeeper turns, then, and walks off, leaving Itachi staring after her. He feels like he’s just been dropped into an alternate reality.
“I’d hurry up if I were you,” Utakata says from behind him. He looks at her. She’s in the process of tossing a pillowcase over her shoulder and into a laundry bin. She fixes him a look. “They don’t like it when you’re late.”
“But I just signed up.”
“You think that matters?” She pulls twenty dollars out of the cash drawer. “There’s your key deposit back,” she says to the backpacker she’s serving. “Have a good one.” She looks back at Itachi. “Seriously, what are you waiting for?”
He leaves.
…
Room eleven-seventeen is dark. The shadows of four bunk beds loom at him out of the darkness. Itachi reaches for the light switch, but hesitates. The bottom bunk opposite the door, mostly hidden by a curtain made out of a sheet, has an arm sticking out of it. Someone’s in, and they’re asleep. Itachi hates waking people up, but he has no idea which beds are free. He flicks the switch.
The lights flicker then come on fully. There’s a groan from the bed and the arm retracts. The sheet twitches, then draws aside, and a bloodshot pink eye glares out at him.
“Uh,” Itachi says. He hadn’t known people could have pink eyes. “Which beds are free?”
There’s another groan. The eye disappears. Then the arm re-emerges and points. The bed above itself and the top bunk in the corner furthest from the door.
“Thanks,” Itachi says.
“S’fine,” comes the muffled reply. “Now turn the fucking light off.”
Itachi obeys and heads for the bed in the corner. He tosses his pack up onto it and turns to go.
There’s a sinking feeling in his stomach telling him that he may have made a bad decision at some point this morning.
…
He relates his story to the blue-skinned guy he ends up working with on the tenth floor. They’re paired up so Itachi can learn how to do hospital corners. He catches on in about five seconds. It’s not rocket science.
His story’s not much of one either, but Kisame sniggers appreciatively. “Me too,” he says, when Itachi tells him about the contract. “I don’t know if any of us have read it.”
It’s mildly reassuring. At least Itachi isn’t alone in not knowing what he’s signed up for.“I think I woke someone up,” he says as he tucks in the second sheet.
“Pale guy?” Kisame asks.
Itachi shrugs. The arm had been pale. Very pale, come to think of it; he’d been able to see the blue lines of the other boy’s veins. “He had pink eyes,” he says.
“That’s Hidan,” Kisame says. “He’s been here forever. He does the night shift.”
“There’s a night shift?” He can’t remember if it was mentioned at all.
“There’s four different shifts,” Kisame explains. He picks the duvet up off the chair he’d tossed it on while stripping the bed and throws it on to the newly made one. “Pull that end down and tuck it under. Yeah, like that. There’s the six to ten shift – Sasori does that, then there’s this one: nine to one. There’s an afternoon shift as well – Pein and Konan, they’re a couple, are on that one. I think it’s half one to half five?” He shrugs. “Then there’s the nights. That’s Hidan and Kakuzu’s job.”
“Oh,” Itachi says.
“Most people get shoved onto this one because of the amount of beds we have to make.”
“Right.” There’s something bothering him. “Do we ever change the duvets?”
“Not unless someone complains, or if someone’s wet the bed, shat themselves, thrown up, or died.”
Itachi looks up at him, wide-eyed. “That happens?”
“Not so much with the death,” Kisame says. “But everything else…” He shrugs. “The others have some stories. I’ve only been here for a week. Found a bottle of piss in the fridge on my first day, though.”
A shudder of revulsion makes its way down Itachi’s spine. “Why?” he asks. “I mean, why would anyone -?”
They move onto the next bed – a top bunk. “Who knows?” Kisame replies. “It’s probably better not to ask. I mean, it’s a bottle of piss in the fridge. Would you really want to know the answer?”
1.This is my personal bugbear about the Naruto-verse. All these different countries with different histories, geographies, and (probably) customs all seem to have the same language and culture in the manga/anime. That…wouldn’t happen. Not in real life. So, in accordance with my headcannon, dialect and customs will vary between characters from the different countries.
