Disclaimer: Copyright belongs to Masashi Kishimoto and Shonen Jump
Notes: Spoilers for chapter 393 and written before chapter 394 (stream of consciousness writing)
And there he inarticulately collapsed at my feet.
The hammer in my heart failed to stop.
Was he alive?
Was he dead?
I couldn't look down.
Ragged breath, the sound of pumping blood. My skin tingled, wet and icy.
I shouldn't have any adrenaline left.
But why couldn't I feel the ache?
The rough stone of the wall behind me was cool beneath my damp fingers.
Our house symbol was emblazoned there on the stone.
But I couldn't look.
I just knew it was there, as it adorned my clothes. Just as it used to adorn his.
How long ago was that?
Was this real?
Was that even real?
For how long had his life been a sham? How long was my life only measured by the worth of my eyes to him?
This wasn't victory.
This was a disaster.
The ardent desire for revenge I'd carried all these years?
Worthless, pointless.
My knees buckled.
This was wrong.
If he was gone, what did I have left?
Where was the satisfaction?
His blood should be covering my hands, dulling my bright blade.
The grim triumph as I silenced his breath, halted his heart, dimmed his sinful light was innocuously absent.
Instead the slow streak of his crimson mark slid down my face, branding his delusional actions.
His incognizant last effort, born of a passion as reprehensible as mine.
Were we the same?
For years we both lusted after an incorrigible truth.
His reality, my truth – were they any different?
Both realities ended with the other's subsequent demise.
Except mine was real.
He lay there and I stood here.
If he had been victorious, would this have been any different?
He would have taken his prize, abandoning me in a sightless hell.
Yes, he would have left me, enjoying his spoils of a pitiful war.
This was different. I could not leave him.
A lifetime of training and abhorrence.
His lifetime of dedicated study and misguided jealousy.
Was I really just a set of eyes?
Not only to my brother, but my slithering mentor, my village?
My friends?
Swallowing, I barely registered the taste of gritty dust and a faint spattering of copper.
I glanced down, captivated in a horrid fascination by his glassy eyes and still form.
He expired of a fatal exhaustion, not my hand.
Was this acceptable?
Or a tireless waste?
I could stand here for hours, yet he would not tell me.
I would never know.
This inadequate victory would never change.