Things were spiralling. Everything was slipping so far out of his control that he wasn't even sure which way was up and which way was down anymore. The word 'loyalty' was sloshing around like water, and the more people said it, the more people whispered it urgently in his ear, the more they angrily demanded it from him, the more they questioned him of it, the further away the word seemed to get. What was loyalty? He had the aching feeling that he had once had a very clear definition in his grasp, but now it had escaped him.

Loyalty.

To his family. His clan. To the community of people that raised him, praised him as he rose through the ranks. The people that smiled at him as he ran down the street on his way home from the Academy, the people that accepted him as their own, unconditionally.

Loyalty.

To his village. His wider family. Every man, woman and child that dwelt within the Leaf's walls that he had sworn to protect the moment that he tied on his hitai-ate and become part of something that was so much bigger than him. To the village, he was a comrade, a protector. One of their own that they accepted no matter what family he came from.

He wasn't going to lie and say that either the village or his clan was perfect. But he didn't want them to be. They were living, breathing organisms made up of individual human lives. If humans weren't perfect, why should he demand that their communities be? Perfection was not his end game, it was harmony. The two were fundamentally different.

So what was really important to him? It was clear that perfection was an impossible dream. It was also becoming increasingly clear that harmony was just as distant. His clan and his village were in conflict, and the natures of both meant that peaceful resolution was just a fairy tale. Should he side with the clan and protect the people that he loves most in the world? Or should he side with the village, and prevent the war that he can sense building, riding on the cusp of the Uchiha's betrayal? The choice should be simple, and the man standing in front of him was very blunt in his statement of the reality of his situation. He has offered Itachi an out: a compromise, something to preserve the honour of his clan and the peace of his village, but at a terrible cost.

"There is no one else to turn to but you." Danzo looked at him with his hard, cold eyes. "You alone can cleanse the sins of your family and stabilize the village." There was a firmness in his voice. Itachi was ANBU, and Danzo was his commander. This was an order, albeit a horrific one, but an order nevertheless.

"I know my family is guilty." Itachi began slowly. The words choked him up. He was finally admitting it out loud. His family was very guilty of the crime that Danzo was ordering him to execute them for. He was finally admitting to both himself and Danzo that the power to save them had slipped out of his grasp. Itachi felt lost. His clan was going to die, whether he struck the blows or not. Nothing would change.

"Their crime is high treason." Danzo said simply. "And it is the custom of the village that high treason is dealt with by team mates and family of the accused. It is your duty to protect your village against those closest to you who have turned against us."

Itachi glared out of his mask, sharingan swirling angrily. "You would have me kill them all. The whole clan: men, women… children."

Danzo did not flinch. He looked at Itachi with stony features. "If you do not dispose of them all, the village will wonder. They will start to poke holes in your motive, wondering if it was just a case of a rouge ANBU going mad… or whether the family had dark secrets that their very loyal, seemingly nice ANBU relative was putting to rights." Danzo sniffed. "The people aren't stupid, as much as it appears so most of the time. If you spare the innocent, the village will put two and two together and realise that you were razing traitors, not turning on your family in a fit of mad rage."

Itachi's lips tightened, pressing together into a flat white line. His mask felt very heavy, like the duty that it symbolised was literally weighing him down. He pictured the people that he had to kill. His aunts, uncles, cousins, his mother, father and…..

"No." The word bubbled to his lips almost immediately. "This is something that I cannot do."

Danzo's eyes narrowed. "Then you are no better than-!"

Itachi held up a hand, cutting off Danzo's rant. He knew the old man had to feel the rage and killing intent that was radiating off his body right now. "My loyalty lies with the village." He said firmly. Deep in his heart, that was his answer. The village was more important to him than the clan. The clan as a whole had decided to protect the village when they joined, right at the very beginning. He himself had entered into that binding contract of loyalty when he graduated the Academy and became a genin. It was a doubly binding oath, one that he had sworn gladly.

Danzo's face looked like a thundercloud. Itachi tried to ignore the lump of dread that was starting to accumulate in the depths of his stomach. He was going to anger one of the most dangerous men in Konoha. Not a good plan, but what else was he supposed to do?

"My loyalty will always be to Konoha." Itachi told the man firmly. "My kin have committed a grave sin. I will not interfere in the village's actions against the guilty. To do so would mark me just as much a traitor as them." His shoulders straightened. "What I will not do is commit the injustice of taking out punishment on the innocent for the crimes of their elders. None of the children so much as even suspect what is brewing in the clan. I am a shinobi. I will stain my hands if the village asks me to. But if the village asks me to turn on innocent children within its own borders and protection, then I am no longer sure that this is the village that I thought I was serving."

Danzo was quiet. "Nobility and justice get nobody anywhere." He spat back at Itachi. "We are shinobi, not honour driven samurai. We live and breathe in the shadows."

"Some shadows are too dark to draw breath in." Itachi said back flatly. "This is the line that I will not cross. Do not ask me to."

Danzo glowers, but Itachi can see now that the man has realised that he is arguing a lost cause. He will not try to order Itachi to shoulder this burden again. He was going to have to find an alternate solution. Itachi was secretly pleased. Danzo was going to have to bow to the Hokage, and follow the route of negotiation and peaceful resolution that Sarutobi stubbornly clung to. If all else failed, there would be a purging, but not a secret one. This one would air the Uchiha's dirty laundry for the whole village to see. Itachi grimly accepted that. The Uchiha would fall from favour, and they would fall hard.

But Sasuke would be safe, and that's all that Itachi cared about. Better scorned and whispered about than dead due to their parents' mistake. He would suffer, but Itachi would make sure that he was there to shield his brother from the worst of it.

Because when it came down to it, Sasuke was the line that he would not cross.