And there is such intense plotage in the manga right now. I bet a lot of ItaSasu shippers are quite pleased by the recent chapters. Their brotherly love makes me teary. I cried when Itachi died, man. ;______;
So, uhm, yeah. This is a long over-due tribute to Uchiha Itachi. Hope you enjoy it.
DISCLAIMER: I do not own Naruto.
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in memoriam
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Funerals are sorrowful affairs of tearful faces and black clothes of mourning. People are supposed to cry and reminisce and listen to a heart-wrenching eulogy. Instead, it is a desolate funeral for a desolate genius. No formal dress, no flowers, no tears. Only a man and a boy standing side by side at the gravestone in silence.
Kisame doesn't know what he's doing here. He doesn't owe the dead a single thing. He's seen death before. And, frankly, it gets old after the first hundred times. Dead people should stay dead; memories of them should be buried deep and sealed with an iron door. The cigarette crushed between his lips is drooping. Filthy habit, he knows, but he can't quite bring himself to care.
Sasuke is hunched over in the crisp, late afternoon weather. Black hair flops languidly in his face, his skin is colored a pasty shade of pale in the faint sunlight peeking out from behind the clouds, dark eyes are dry. "That fuckin' bastard didn't even put me in his will," Kisame snorts, baring his shark teeth in a fierce grin.
Not even a monosyllabic reply today, the man notes vaguely. They stand in silence for a long stretch of time. Kisame has no more left to say except adieu. "I'll be seein' ya' in hell then," he tells the gravestone. The wind ruffles the tree leaves. He tips his hat at Sasuke before walking away. The graveyard gate creaks ominously then shuts with a rattling clamor. And he is gone (probably won't be coming back either).
Now Sasuke is alone. Dead brothers don't count as company.
The wind blows dejectedly around him, whisking up leaves, sending them crinkling and crackling away. Sasuke sighs. "You suck, Itachi," he murmurs quietly, almost to himself. "Fucking dying like that. You—"
He is gripped with the sudden urge to kick the gravestone with every ounce of strength he can muster. Sasuke laughs, shaking his head almost bitterly. Damn. Damn it all to hell. He can almost hear his stupid, elder brother's deadpan, yet somehow mocking in the same breath, voice whispering to him ("Disrespecting the dead now are we, Sasuke?").
Pale fingers reach out to gently stroke the face of the gravestone. Uchiha Itachi is gone and departed. He will be erased from life permanently—papers will be burned, the incriminating evidence destroyed, people shot. Sasuke scowls. Even in death his brother is unclean. The burning flames had probably been waiting eagerly for him at the end of the tunnel. Maybe Itachi will replace the devil someday.
The thought makes Sasuke smile sadly. His brother might replace the devil, but he'll never get to fall in love, or eat cake on his twenty-second birthday, or poke his younger brother's forehead again. Despite having hated his brother for most of his life, Sasuke thinks that he will miss him a little.
For a second, a filmy image of dead body floods his eyes. The dark-haired boy has to squeeze his eyes shut, pinch the bridge of his nose, and take breaths to keep from vomiting in a place of resting souls. Itachi's death was not exactly peaceful. But, if he were to be truthful, Itachi probably wanted to go down in a mess of crimson blood and gore—that sadistic, masochistic bastard.
He scowls at the familiar sensation of a finger poking his forehead. When he opens his eyes, however, there is no one there. This illusion has him simultaneously rolling his eyes and smiling in a morose fashion. Itachi, Itachi, Itachi. Sasuke turns to walk away, tucking the eulogy carved on his elder brother's gravestone in the back of his mind.
'Genius. Sinner. Brother.'