Disclaimer: Don't own Naruto…

Summary: Within every clan there is a deep-rooted history, a dark power that defines the clan's legacy as well as their shinobi. The Uchiha know this, but sometimes, there are exceptions. ItachixItachi, mind-screwing, and if one squints and tilts their head, some possible incest.

Author's Note: This is basically a fan service story I wrote for a dear friend of mine in exchange for lolz, and this particular pairing is so hard to find that I had to make tribute to it. Trust me when I say some things are worth the effort. ^_^

Curiosity

There are many traits in human nature that have allowed them to further expand their knowledge of the world, both foreign and domestic.

Curiosity is one of those traits.

Poisoned kunai…

One hits its mark.

"Itachi!" Kisame bellows in alarm, just moments before hoards of black flames engulf the surrounding forest. The blackened sky shrouds in smoke and ash, the sight of dark-flamed amaterasu engulfing the mountainside.

Things had indeed gotten out of hand. If Itachi has been forced to resort to that jutsu.

Indeed. With five four-man squads of anbu and hunter-nin teams surrounding their position, after having infiltrated the Hidden grass and performing the Jinchūriki sealing jutsu, Itachi and Kisame are pressed to end the battle as soon as possible. Itachi was low on chakra and Kisame has taken considerable damage.

The flames, for the most part, do their job. Instantly incinerating 8 of the 11 remaining shinobi, leaving the last 3's defensive line in shambles.

Kisame, seeing the opportunity, performs a shark bomb jutsu and takes out the two weaker men while they are distracted. Though the third manages to evade at the last moment with a complicated earth style replacement jutsu.

The grass shinobi leaps into the air, intent on retreating and reporting the battle to his superiors. He makes it no more than a hundred yards before he is attacked, mid-air, by an entourage of shuriken coming from the raven-haired teen suspended gracefully in midair.

"Shit." The man hisses distastefully, before he's hit dead on by the overwhelming number of weaponry.

…Only to be replaced by a bundle of tightly woven grass that explodes a moment later, scattering fine-edged needles in every which direction.

Off in the distance, the grass-nin watches with an inkling of pride as the great Itachi Uchiha lands on a tree branch, bleeding, and staring down at his small wound with something that could be identified as surprise.

The Grass-nin smirks to himself. That is until the icy sting of steel sliding across his throat fills him with dread. But he remains composed, having expected this outcome. He had not been dumb enough to think he'd survive, but he was no coward either. He had taken this mission knowing he'd likely die, but with the honor of knowing he had done so as a true shinobi.

Chills run down his spine, as that cold, smooth voice sounds next to his ear. "That is an interesting poison." He feels the blade push closer to his neck. "What is its purpose?"

There is no point in hiding it anymore, now that he's been caught.

Despite his fear, the Grass shinobi manages to speak. "It's my specialty. A poison designed to increase the potential of killing an enemy." He let out a small breath. "It targets the shadow clone's chakra structure, deforming its chemical make-up, and then converting it to physical form."

Silence.

"The cure." The dark haired teen demands quietly, deadly.

Brown eyes lock with red. "There isn't one."

Slash. Death is quick and painless. Not even a gasp escapes the Grass ninja's lips as the life leaves him.

Itachi stares impassively towards the one who'd killed the Grass ninja: his clone. The clone does not look pleased, and despite his impassiveness, Itachi is sure that deep inside, just out of his reach, he feels the same. Do they feel the same?

The same solemn expression, the same cool composure, and same immediate reactions. They are the same, but…

Are they the same?

They stare deeply into the other's eyes, challengingly, neither moving nor giving any indication of weakness. Assessing one another. Not a hint of accusing or ridicule. Equals.

Itachi's eyes flicker briefly to the wound on his clone's side, before their eyes lock again.

A breathless statement: a knowing one. "You are mad."

A stoic stare meets his claim.

Perhaps they will not be so much alike after all.

When twins are born, they look alike, but that is the only similarity between them from the start. For they cannot drink the same water nor breathe the same air nor stand on the same ground.

Because when they stand, side by side…

One will be on the left, and the other the right.

No two people can ever be truly the same. Because one must stand on the left…

And the other must stand on the right.

Only one can stand in the center.

Only one…

It was strange for Kisame to watch the two Itachi's scrutinizing each other. One with the same indifference he'd grown so adept to understanding and the other with the slightest crease in his thin brow.

Now, it didn't take a genius to sense that something was amidst with this situation. And Kisame was not a fool by any standards.

He maintained his peace through silence. Which was undoubtedly for the best, for while Itachi may have been a man of great calm he was by no means patient with those who pry into his affairs. And both these Itachis probably only had half as much patience between the both of them as one on his own.

Kisame may have been eager to battle the best for the entertainment of bloodshed and his own twisted amusement, but he was not so much ready to die by the fluttering of soft words and an eternal nightmare in Hell because he had questioned his partner's ability to maintain his jutsus properly.

It would have been the death of him.

A week passed and still the clone had yet to vanish, and to add insult to injury, the damn thing saw it necessary to question himself, his original self, as to just how he'd managed to fall victim to the effects of such a pointless poison administered by an equally worthless grass ninja. This had sparked the unspoken rivalry between the two…

…And this is how we arrive at the current situation:

Two Itachi's staring each other down with the impassive velocity of two alpha wolves ready to go tooth and nail in one last epic battle.

Poor Kisame trapped between two forces of nature that sent even the nightmares of the most hardened men away into the comfort of the night to make way for the true prophet of hell.

And, a single dango lying helplessly upon the plate, atop the table, centered in the dead center of the motel room where all three of them were to be staying.

(Kisame had tried and failed to rent a different room, because there were no others available that night. But it was mostly a failure because there were no other motels in the village. Poor thing…)

Now it was war and using his excellent, and not nearly accredited enough, judgment Kisame chose that moment to declare he had a few errands to run around the area and that he'd return in a few hours.

He left a little more hurriedly than he'd have liked, having not wanted to draw the Itachis attention, but the Itachis were too busy silently challenging each other to care that he was in a hurry to escape their presence. They couldn't really blame Kisame, though they did cast quick, suspicious glances towards him as he left the room- just to let him now he'd best not return for a while.

It was the clone that broke the silence first. "Hn." And that was all that was needed. It said all that needed to be said in one brief sound which no other could truly understand as he, his original self, could.

"You will fade to nothing some day." Came Itachi's smooth, heartless voice; like a blade slicing through the air. "Yet knowing this, you continue to linger."

The clone, glared.

"This may be so, but we are still as one, and it may very well be you who will vanish from this world." The clone states with that same silky tone, though it tilts dangerously on that of annoyance. "You may believe that it is you who conjured me, but that is merely your perception, nothing more.

"Hn, I see." Itachi meets his clone's gaze evenly and maintains their impassive stare. "You still begrudge me." There was no need to make it a question. They both knew the answer.

A glint of something unspeakable crosses the clone's face before it is put back under strict control. "You know as well as I what it is that forces me to linger even now."

Itachi raises a brow. "The poison." He knows this is not so, but still he…he feels that he should discern something for himself. And none other but himself, this clone, will ever know the truth to which he denies even himself.

"Is of the most deceptive. It still flows through my veins as we speak, but…" A knowing grimace graces his lips. "Its intended effects wore off days ago. You understand."

Yes. Yes Itachi did. And it sent a very real shiver of warning spiraling up his spine.

"All the same." Itachi drawls smoothly, eyes as intense as ever even as he lets them droop idly. "It is I who is master and it is I who has right to the last one."

Both Itachis look down to the single dango stick motionlessly displayed on the plate for all to see.

(Yes. This whole mind-screwing fight has been over a single stick of dango. Seriously, Uchiha and their sweets, but I guess they're not particularly fond of sharing with others…except those few exceptions of course.)

"Master?" The clone questions the notion darkly, quietly. That had been in a tone to which even the great Itachi himself was wary, for he knew its indications better than anyone else. It was his after all.

The air about them became as thick as lead, settling in the lungs like an iron shield. Not even a kunai would have been able to pierce it.

The first blow is thrown just seconds after the other draws for a weapon. It is a match of equals in the sort only Uchiha can accomplish, and it damn well would have earned its place in history had there been anyone around to witness.

Blood was minimal and words nearly nonexistent. This was no longer a fight for their dominance or the much-desired dango, but a fight to prove the very essence of their existences and the sole right to possess it. It was a fight of unheard magnitude, of their ideals and most of all, the battle to once and for all settle the deepest conflicts within Itachi; a hatred of himself, spawned by the anger left to fester within the deepest reaches of his soul; the guilt turned inward on itself to become as perverse and destructive as the very boy Itachi strove to protect.

And so they fought, their hatred flared in the face of their tormenter and a keen perception of what it was that made them so restless, so very unlike what coated the surface to the likeness of a stone statue of marble, unfeeling and unmoved, unaffected by the decays of time, and forever trapped in the sphere of silence.

This was their fight; this was his fight…

And he would see it through to its conclusion.

Blood spilt across the wooden floors, fanning magnificently upon its surface in the intranet design in which a flower blooms, webs of delicate crimson. Piercingly keen eyes, red as the thickest blood, locked in a moment of delicate infinite balance. Ink black hair laying smoothly down pale cheeks and rigid backs, slick with gloss like oil.

The clone watched without expression as Itachi rose to his feet with the elegance of a fallen majesty, the dark, rich blood pooling under foot like an ominous mirror; without reflection and without light. He looked down to his hand, watching with indifference as blood began to gather in the center of his palm, rushing forth from the gash down his arm. In a moment of clarity as only one who has looked upon themselves and seen the truth of their existence, he let the blood fall to the floor, dripping rhythmically to join the crimson stream below.

He approached Itachi intent to intense his very soul shook with the resolve: an acceptance he, they, understood. The time of redemption…

Itachi watched, his clone proceeded, and in an instant of pure instinct, greater than anything he'd ever known, they connected. Their lips were heated and fierce, all consuming as though trying to devourer the other with force alone. Tongues fought for dominance, yet drew the other deeper into themselves, equal, balanced, the same need rushing through their veins.

Bliss…

It was with steady fingers and assured hands that they removed the fabric between them, unhurried and expectant, feeling the increasing anticipation within the other's body: their bodies. They could sense the growing magnetism between them, pulling each other further into the other's embrace. No words were spoken for none are needed when you already understand what the other is thinking, when they themselves are thinking it.

But…

Stripes of shadow engulfed them faster than the flutter of a heartbeat, tying the clone by the wrists and holding the neck down, keeping him in place as Itachi slid over his restrained form, slick as a serpent.

…There were settle differences.

The clone stared up at Itachi, a glint of blazing defiance deeply concealed within the endless liquid depths, vast as the universe itself, and Itachi stared right back, understanding but unmoving in the face of his own heart. He would not be swayed; he would not cower in the face of his greatest enemy; he would not lose to anyone, not even himself.

It was not the rage of an Uchiha scorned by too many empty winters or the broken sobs of a broken children that left the clone's lips when at last they parted, not even a word of acknowledgement, but what came was something far worse; far, far worse: a small bitter smile and an even darker laugh. It was the creature within his heart- pure as it may have at once seemed- the curse of the Uchiha clan in all its iniquity.

This was the face of madness, of desire, of power. It was everything that was and everything that shouldn't be. Raw, twisted, untamed; it was the very spirit of the famed sharingan, personified in the form of Itachi's clone. This was not Itachi; this was what Itachi could be, should be. This is the face of the sharingan's true power.

"You will obey me." The clone laughed silently, so cold, so possessive, staring up with hooded, desire-laden eyes. "I will not be possessed by you. I am no Madara."

"Nor Sasuke." The clone chuckled at the bone-shattering grip on his wrist. "But you could be." The clone arched his back and hissed delightfully at the pain when that grip tightened further.

Itachi leans down, his hands pulling the cloak from his clone's shoulder with one smooth motion. His lips brush through the clone's bangs, his breath fanning the delicate hair.

"You will never have me." Itachi breathes.

Silence. It doesn't last long.

The clone raises his head ever so slightly. He whispers, an echoing in the back of Itachi's mind. "We already do."

Raw and rough: Itachi did not even prepare the clone before he plunged himself into the tight heat, but ironically enough, it had been the clone that had hissed in protest the moment Itachi's finger touched his puckering entrance to do so. Not even Itachi would deny the possessed clone the pain and rapture it desired when it gave him a sinister look he'd not seen since his last encounter with Madara.

It would settle for nothing less.

Itachi grabbed the clone's thigh and held it above its head before throwing the other leg over his shoulder, holding the clone in place as he thrust inward. The clone's body greeted the intrusive muscle with a firm squeeze, taking him in completely each time. Itachi's grip tightened when he looked down to find the clone watching him with that arrogant smirk- small and amused- as one watches a great spectacle with practiced expectancy.

This creature was not new to this; it was as old as the Uchiha clan itself- perhaps older- and had many a time gazed lustfully to the prodigies of old, finding bliss in how easily it seduced them with the promise of power.

Itachi quickened his pace, leaning over and thrusting his hips against the clone's thighs in strong, steady strokes. Itachi's piercing red eyes stared intensely into the clone's, locking them. The clone's breathing quickened, muscles flexing, and sweat building on his brow, his hands struggled in its bonds to reach up to Itachi, to touch him, to possess him with its power.

The sound of wet muscle and skin slapping together heatedly filled the room as Itachi met the end each thrust. The clone threw his head back and weaved his fingers through his own hair, gripping painfully at the locks and arching his back, thrust up to meet Itachi's movements. Itachi grunted and thrust even harder, more wildly.

The clone suddenly gasped, eyes dilating and pulsing with an insatiable hunger, mouth opening just the slightest bit. It writhed and tossed and turned under Itachi's weight wildly, nearly ripping its hair out from the force of its grip as again and again Itachi plunged full on into its prostate.

Without warning, the clone's long legs slipped from their perches and wrapped around Itachi's shoulders, pulling him down so that the clone's ragged breath was caressing his ear. Itachi did not stop his thrusts, even as the clones whispered into his ear.

"Be mine." It touched its sweat slicked cheek to Itachi's, moaning as its whole body tightened with the impending release. "You belong to us: to the clan. You are ours!"

The clone suddenly spasmed, legs securing Itachi's lithe body to him in a vice grip as the young prodigy continued to thrust into his quaking body beneath him. Cum from the clone shot between them, across Itachi's abs and chest, stopping just below his chin.

With a few more thrusts from his powerful hips, the heated coil in Itachi's stomach finally burst, and with shoulders ripped from the clone's twitching legs, head throw back, and lips parted to reveal gritted teeth, Itachi came deep within the clone. A shiver ran down his spine when his chest jolted forward with the sensation of rapture, whole body shaking, convulsing. His vision turned white for the briefest of seconds, clouded by a misty haze. No sound escaped him though, only a strained breath.

After a time Itachi's body became still from the shuddering, his hands on either side of the clone's head as he leaned down, sweat dripping from his face. "You may wear my face, but I do not belong to you or the clan." Itachi whispered, face set in stone, but eyes burning with renewed life. "I am a leaf shinobi."

An amused smirk crossed the clone's flushed face. "Former shinobi of the Leaf. Try again." His cold, ever-knowing eyes set upon the young prodigy, expression set in a perverse pleasure Itachi never wanted to understand, but helplessly did.

Itachi's eyes closed wearily and he leaned away from the clone, releasing its bounds and allowing it to sit up. "I am a brother before all else." Itachi breathed, quietly. "I am Sasuke's. I belong only to Sasuke."

The clone grinned then, a wide and deceitful thing, bearing its teeth with sinister glee. "Ah, I see now. Interesting." The clone laughed, before his expression became solemn, betraying its true age, its deep history of pain. "No wonder Madara has taken such a shine to you despite your- loyalties." The clone's eyes hooded, a small smirk pulling at the edge of its lip, pain subsiding in favor of a taunt. "You are Sasuke's very own Izuna then."

Itachi stiffened, waiting, knowing. The price he knew he must pay for his village, for his brother. The clone leaned over Itachi, eyes blazing, and Itachi knew he could not pull away, could never truly escape.

"We have Sasuke, young one. And so long as we have him." The clone drawled, his eyes shining with dark mirth. "So long as you love him. You will never escape us." The clone leaned closer. "You will never escape me."

Itachi's face was expressionless, cold as a winter's embrace, but the words he spoke, were colder still. "Nor you me. You will never escape your desire, your longing. Through my brother you may touch…" Itachi kissed the clone, softly but passionlessly. "But you may never possess."

The clone smirked, eyes brimming with arrogant amusement as he spoke. "You and Madara's bother- you're both just curiosities of the Uchiha clan aren't you?" he tilted his head, in mock inquisitiveness. "Because that's exactly what Izuna said…" His lips pressed to Itachi's forehead as he breathed, in no more than a whispered. "Before he died." With that the clone was gone, and Itachi sigh in weariness now that he was finally alone.

He glanced down to the mess that covered the floor, cum and blood beginning to soak into the wooden planks. He gazed upon the scratch marks embedded into the wood, and the sweat that stained the floor dark gray. He blinked once before getting to his feet, slipping his clothes on as he did so. His face was void of emotion, except a small frown of annoyance that died as quickly as it came.

He'd have to clean up the mess before Kisame returned.

But sometimes…

Humans are the curiosity.

Author's Note

Oh my God! It is finally done. After all the procrastination and the staring blankly at the computer screen not wanting to start the pr0nz, because I am simply difficult like that, the fic is finally done. This will please my friend greatly. Please review…

Sorry for any spelling mistakes, but this was unbeta-ed. ^_^'