Dancing on the Corpses' Ashes
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Summary: The Akatsuki members scatter separately following their final defeat against Konoha. After years of solitary seclusion, Itachi decides to look for Kisame. Itachi's POV. One shot.
A/N: If it's not obvious enough, I don't own the title. It's taken from one of At the Drive in's singles called Invalid Litter Department, which I also love. And also, this is YAOI.
I never had specific desire to live like a hermit. It never was among my intentions to deliberately estrange myself from the world. While it's true to some extent that I don't appreciate a lot of people, it's equally true that I could tolerate, or even be half-impressed by, selected presences. It's almost funny that lately I've begun to entertain certain thoughts to the contrary; that in truth, I may just be among those who are sick of living like a fugitive with unresolved issues with the past, living like wild mushrooms do, living for the sole purpose of surviving, fighting extinction and the like.
Ah...this isn't the life I pictured ahead of me. This shouldn't be the result, direct or indirect, of my partnership with him. And if truth be told, there was a point in time when I could only obscurely recall how he looked like. It's amazing, isn't it? That prior to that, with one quick glance, I could easily tell what was inside his mind. Even without words, there wasn't any moment of difficulty where understanding each other was concerned; there was only the initiative to understand each other even without logic or reason or explanation. As for his expressions, they were of course far too remarkable to disregard. In fact, on that night, I knew exactly what he wanted me to do.
Run.
His eyes glimmered amidst the flame, shouting for me to chase after my life. If we stay together our chances at survival is slim to none; if we separate, there's a shot. Those were the words his eyes channeled to me: Save myself, leap over the crossroad and forget about him. He must've mistaken me for a braver person.
In any case, the flames might've consumed him soon after that. I have seriously no way of knowing, let alone confirming. I sprinted to the woods as my grip to life loosened and loosened with each hurried step. I couldn't look back for the life of me; I didn't want to see his burnt remains being vandalized by those Konoha bastards. It was quite enough to have his words to remember him by. Or at least that's what I had in mind then, being too idealistic to face the ugly truth. Ah, I could hardly imagine how naive I was. Up to this day, I refuse to believe that I let him fend for himself, seeing how ambiguous his plight was. And to be honest, I wish I could take more of his than just his words with me.
But the question remains: Is he dead, really? If he was, it would only prove that he was willing to perish before/for me; if he isn't...it would only go to show that somehow, pursuing to further this aimless journey is worth it. If truth be told, I don't know the official story. It's been six years and counting. I haven't had so much as a glimpse of his shadow after the incident. Sometimes I get lapses in which I think I've seen someone who looks like him. When I turn to look again, the vision is gone and the pieces of his background turn to tears. In other times I would also hear his voice. It would persist and echo as if it was coming from a special place, somewhere seemingly within reach. But when I tend to strain my ears harder, I realize that that place is merely inside me.
A few days ago, at a shady pub up in the mountains, I heard two lower species of Ninja babbling nonchalantly about their recent mission. They mentioned some eerie acquaintance who fit almost perfectly his features except for one amiss detail; the person was not a shinobi. I stopped on my tracks then, wondering what I should be thinking. Should I react? Demand them to give up more information? What? Under happier circumstances, I would've pinned one of them against the wall, strangled him to his limit and having made them surrender the necessary details, killed them both. But neither was the circumstance happy nor bearable and hence, I could only get by it by choosing to ignore what I've heard. Besides, it has been so long ago since I engaged in a decent talk with someone.
Yes, you might say that I threw away the chance to conclude my unsettled relationship with the past. But if you were in my shoes, it reasonably wouldn't occur to you that he might be alive, still.
I left the pub not shortly after I took a last sip at my sake. Outside, while ambling along the road that descended to the foot of the mountains, something strange happened. It all came back to me in a flash. A kind of shaft seemed to have drilled its way into my head to bring back the things that I both wanted and hated to remember. I suddenly could envision his face, his manner of speaking, walking, fighting with accurate vividness. I could remember everything with exactly nothing left out. Even his voice seemed to be mumbling just right behind my ears. He felt so undoubtedly alive, so close beside me.
These hideous reminders only convinced me that I may not be entirely doing myself a favor by just sitting around, waiting for some minor magic to arrive to bring back the old Akatsuki glory. Which by the way is never going to happen anymore. And since I'm not particularly a fan of the occult phenomena or inclined to suppose that a ghost was responsible for that fleeting encounter, I decided to interpret the event as a product of intuition. Yes, he might be alive. A gut feeling told me so.
As of this moment, he may be wandering alone in cognito, thriving, looking for me. He may be visiting other countries on foot, trying to neatly wrap things up, make ends meet for god knows what purpose. There is nothing more to lose. There is only too much to gain at this point. I walk on this road while I welcome any possibility in store. Anything at all. I look back at the years and only realize that time doesn't improve things. If anything, it buries them and in the process kills them to never be remembered. I'm not about to let it this time, mark me.
And this much I know at the present: I have to find him and in so doing, find out if I have real grounds to continue existing, or not.
END
A/N: the closing line suggests that Itachi's life's continuance depends on his finding out if Kisame is still alive. Or at least, that's what I intended to say while typing this fic. If Kisame's dead, Itachi is liable to committing suicide, of course. I think that is also made clear when I said that, for Itachi, there was nothing else to lose. So yeah, dying at that point would hardly sway him.
And yeah, this is open-ended. I don't think I'd write a sequel to this, since it may just spoil the theme of this piece. At any rate, thanks for reading.