bleed to black
"Of the seven deadly sins, only envy is no fun at all."
--Joseph Epstein
i.
sloth
Kakashi thinks of lazy summer days, flipping the pages of a book under the shade of a tree while his students tried to impress him. He thinks of the fact that he may never see them again, and counts off the little details he can remember about them.
Green eyes, sunshine hair, bloodlust…
He gets to number seven-hundred-fifty-three when Konan appears outside his cell door with blank eyes and dark hair, and makes him lose count. She's distracting, a treacherous part of him thinks.
She doesn't say a word, so Kakashi does, in a deceptively light voice, "Here's what I remember."
He pauses, seven-hundred and fifty-three useless facts falling away in the face of the most haunting memory.
"I remember that you made them scream."
ii.
gluttony
He can't remember ever having felt so dead inside. He can still feel Sakura's desperate, scared fingers wrapping themselves around his own, and the way Naruto looked to him for guidance, and the way he let them both down.
He can still see the red and white of the fan on Sasuke's back as he stood in front of the three of them, trying to prove he could be a savior, too.
His eyes are dry, but that doesn't mean he's not hurting.
Kakashi spends his days trying to sleep and never wake up. He knows that Sakura would be disappointed in him, Sasuke disgusted, and Naruto downright furious. He's moved on from tragedy so many times, but now it seems impossible.
He will not eat, but he needs to be alive for Akatsuki's twisted reasons, so Konan brings him his meals. She is the only other person he ever sees, although she never speaks. Still, something about her brings him an odd sense of peace: the rhythmic way she sets down his food, arranges it with barely a sound, the graceful, lady-like way she kneels down, her cloak flaring out about her knees.
He could see her as a geisha, he thinks. An absurd thought, but she looks the part, and acts the part, with her long-fingered hands that reach out to give him a cup, of what, he doesn't know.
"It isn't poisoned," she tells him, speaking for the first time. Her voice is soft, rustling, mournful, and he realizes he has been holding the cup for too long without drinking.
He smiles wryly so she can see, his mask having been torn off long ago. "I know."
He sets down the drink.
Ten minutes of silence later, Konan gathers up the untouched dishes.
iii.
wrath
Three weeks later, and Kakashi is regaining some of himself.
"Why are you doing this?" he asks Konan every time he sees her approach. She always comes alone, always comes silent as a ghost.
She never answers.
"Why did you attack Konoha?" he demands, voice rising.
She holds out his cup to him. He throws it back.
She doesn't even flinch, only blinks at the shards on the floor at her feet. Kakashi hears the thumping of steps drawing closer, and bares his teeth.
"Why does he leave you alone with me if he doesn't trust you?"
Konan kneels down to pick up the shards.
"Careful," Kakashi says in a cruel voice. "Don't cut yourself."
Four weeks later, Kakashi is losing his mind.
iv.
greed
Konan continues to appear, though she spent two days away. Kakashi is sure Pein didn't want her alone with him, then laughs. Even madmen have people to love, so what does that make him? He's lost everybody.
Konan is the only person he can call his own, and he doesn't think he really wants her.
"You want to rule the world," he says to her bleakly. "Why?"
Konan gives him a bowl of rice, a pair of chopsticks.
"Answer me!"
"The same reason anyone wants anything," she murmurs, not looking at him. "Why do you want to see your students?"
"Don't compare yourself with me."
"You love them," she continues, eyes fixed on her hands as she sets out the rest of his dishes, ceramic clinking against the tray. She brings him a lot of food, he thinks, considering he's a prisoner. "And I love Pein."
"Would you follow him to hell?"
She finally meets his eyes and says without wavering, "Yes."
So she knows that's where she's headed.
Kakashi turns away from her and lifts the chopsticks to his mouth for his first bite of food in a month.
Konan doesn't leave his side until he finishes.
v.
pride
Almost three months after his capture, Kakashi meets Pein. He comes down with Konan, his steps heavier than hers, his presence much more imposing. Kakashi looks him over lazily, unwilling to play the part of a prisoner before him.
"I've heard much about you, of course," Pein says after a moment's scrutiny.
"Good things, I hope," he says pleasantly.
Pein looks at Konan, then at Kakashi. "Konan tells me you've stopped eating again."
"Yeah, well." Kakashi shrugs. "The quality of the food went down."
Pein's gaze hardens. "If we need to apply force, we will," he warns. Konan shifts beside him, but he doesn't even look at her. "You are not going to die."
"Wish I could say the same for you." Kakashi lifts his chin, keeps his eyes on Konan, and finds it ironic that she's the one giving him strength with her familiarity.
Pein leaves the two of them alone, and Kakashi observes, "He's charming. A real winner you've got there."
vi.
lust
A man has needs, and Kakashi's is a book that offers him memories. Of teachers and teammates and students yelling at him and trying to peek over his shoulder.
"Not until you're older, Naruto," he remembers saying.
Konan offers him anything he might need – everything but freedom and his students, everything he wants – and one day, bold in her presence, he invites her into his cell.
She is not oblivious, knows what he wants, and steps in anyways.
vii.
envy
He's become much too open and talkative, Kakashi decides, but mystery was just another luxury stripped from him.
He says, "I wish I was the kind of man who could remember."
He used to remember seven-hundred-fifty-three useless facts about his students, tick them off on his fingers, but he can no longer imagine Sakura's eyes or Naruto's hair, and Sasuke is just a fog.
He traces his gaze over Konan's face and tries to imprint the contours and shadows into his memory, but he won't. he hates himself for trying anyways.
He says, "Too bad I'm not Pein," when she starts to pick up his dinner dishes, ready to return to her God's side.
"No one is Pein," she says. Or did she say 'pain'? Kakashi wonders.
He tells her, "I hate the women who don't give freedom a chance," and she finally falters.
"There is no freedom." She shuts the door of his cell. "There is no other side of the bars."