Last Walk
He cuts through the same forest every day, shooting between trees and wondering if he'll see it. He runs to it so desperately it's as if he thinks it will disappear, but no matter how weak and slow or wounded he is, it's always there.
The light.
There's a permanent light on inside the cabin, and this never strikes him as odd even though the place hasn't been used in ages. He likes to imagine that his mother is in there, knitting sweaters out of nothing or stirring hot cocoa with smiling faces all around her.
He knows that this is a fantasy, knows that it's nothing more than that, but it doesn't stop him from hoping. He hopes that she found her way to heaven, hopes that she's happy now because she never was before.
His mother was a strange one.
She fed him half-truths and he swallowed them whole. …But at least she cared enough to lie. She could have been bitter and brutal and honest. She could have torn him in two, ripped his heart down its seam.
But she didn't. And the light is on in the cabin. It's for him and he's sure of it…so he figures his mother must have made her way to heaven after all. He figures she must have finally remembered to give him that sign, too, the one he's been waiting for his entire life. –The one that proves she loved him.
He peeks inside the window—just once, after killing Itachi—and he finds her sitting there, waiting for him. As expected. And…and his father is there too. Something he didn't expect. His arms are crossed and his mouth is set in a grim line, but he's there. They look so warm and carefree that it's impossible to resist joining them.
He opens the door and says "hello" to his parents for the first time in eight years, and when the light comes flooding around him, it's even brighter than he'd ever thought. It's so bright, but his parents are smiling and he smiles back.
This is when he realizes that dying doesn't hurt.
In fact, dying is the easiest thing in the world.
Fin.