A/N: Okay, after reading the latest chapter, where Zetsu mentions Itachi possibly having sustained damage prior to his fight with Sasuke, I began to wonder what such damage might be. And, having a really dirty mind, this is what I conjured.

Enjoy the meloncholy smut, loves.

Farewell, O Ye My Blackened Heart

It was lust laced with desperation, melded with bitter stirrings of something more.

Purple-lacquered nails dug hard into slate shoulders, chiseled by years of battle. Fingertips turned raw against the rough blue-grey skin, near to bleeding. A moan, soft but there nonetheless, echoed in the rain. Unbound hair, glossy as raven feathers, was strewn over alabaster skin, flushed with desire. A growl rumbled in his lover's chest, before perfect ivory needles sunk themselves into the smooth joint of neck and shoulder. Tossing back his head, the man moaned again, louder, made throaty by the euphoria of pleasure and pain blending. Angular hips bucked, furthering their meld, making his legs tremble around his partner as he felt the taut rod slide deeper. The arms about his waist curled tighter, to erase all distance between them.

They were of the same stem, two souls, conjoined.

Wind of life, hot in his ear, betrayed what words would never say. The body in his grasp felt like frailty, a thing no other would ever feel. Blood tasted of passion, unconstrained. Sex – raw in his nostrils, the musk of lifeblood and sweat and even tears. Inconceivable, undeniable tears. It was all his, to take and consume, swallowing cries and lapping fluid, crimson, beautiful. This was his conquest, here in the rains, in the Mist. Roughly, he sounded his desire and speared forward. A delicious sting lit across his back, the bite of nail into skin. His lover shook again, sweet friction filling hard flesh with sensation as muscle clenched around him. The other's spine arched, drawing flush against him, obliterating the chill of space.

Rain beat down, but it could not cool blazing hearts, made molten in twisted love, and the final chance to say, silently, those three words.

"I love you."

As they knew it, as they felt it. It was a mockery of a sham of a facade. It was a word that put a name on an inexplicable, utterly foreign feeling. The deep-down stirrings of civilian's love was not a thing ninja indulged in, much less ninja such as they. In another world, perhaps they could have felt it, softly. But here in this crime-syndicate underground, love was a force of manipulation, otherwise, a liability. A perversion of the emotion. They knew it only as a force, expressed with force, with pain and blood, as they had expressed themselves all along. Only in peripheral could they know of it gently.

The pale fluid of desire flowed free, with a cry and a spasm. Gysering, it fell upon the fecund earth, but nothing could arise from this seed sown.

Now, in the volcanic climax, was the twist most evident. They were violent and brutal at the most impassioned, closest moments. Then the fires banked, subdued in the chemical wash of post-orgasm, innundating their minds.

The harshness was past and now, made vulnerable, they cradled each other, letting the rain wash away the blood and sweat and semen. They were seperate but still close, the forceful joining of souls past and now they lay together, sharing warmth listening to the rythm of their hearts in tandem. Never would either know that this was truly the closest they would get to expressing love as it was meant to be, but deep down, they had an idea of it.

He leaned against his great lover's chest, surrounded by mighty arms. This was the only time he felt human, when he was left sleepy and brutalized by his "romantic" exertions. All other moments of his life, he was more. He was his mission, his duty, ruled by principle, the convulouted mores of a genius who taunted madness.

As for the lover... this too, was the only time he truly felt human. When the stark edge of life was dulled, and the war between his humanity and the darkness he was born with abated. Looking down at the figure in his arms, he brushed a strand of raven-dark hair from weak eyes. It was a tender gesture, a rare thing he could express no other time.

Together they lay, under the crying sky, letting the pain fade into the glowing lull of post-coital bliss, and letting that, too fade into the grey miasama.

Slowly, Itachi rose, disentangling himself from Kisame's arms. He had returned to himself, and it was now time to return to his duty. He was injured now, from the ferocity of their lovemaking, but it would prove no hindrance. The shinobi dressed in silence, not even sparing his partner a look. Kisame watched him, face pensive and quiet. When Itachi departed, he felt a sharp pang rise unbidden. Quickly, he glanced away and went about the task of re-garbing himself. He had his own duty to carry out, and time was too fleeting to waste.

As the two men departed to destiny, both could not help but remember the other, memories coming up fresh and unwanted. Both tasted their mortality in the reminescince, and knew they would meet again, for a final time. It hurt, strangely, this odd sensation of regret and loss. It offered serenity, this knowledge of the final journey. The taste was bittersweet, tinged with the flavor of a man.


Familiarity breeds contempt, they said. Not so. Not always.

.

.

.

But was it not also said that love was closest kin to hate?