Disclaimer: The only thing I own is your soul.
Vanity
There is dry blood under his fingernails and it's driving him mad. He tries vainly, as he walks, to scratch it out, but his short nails slide together uselessly without dislodging the slightest amount of congealed blood. With a frustrated sigh, he forces his hands to his sides and focuses on trying to locate a washroom. The hideout he is in is unfamiliar and large and he doesn't know where anything is, much less where he is.
Hideout. Kabuto and Orochimaru prefer 'headquarters', but to Sasuke it will always be a hideout because it feels like they are hiding, running away—
(Running away from what?)
The hideout is cold—like always—but Sasuke has become all too used to the cold, both from within and without. The hallway is small and narrow, barely enough room for two people to walk side-by-side. Right now he is walking alone. Without any hindrances.
Idly, his left thumbnail scrapes under his left middle nail.
His eyes zero in on a door and he idly raps his knuckles against the wood before pushing it open without waiting for an answer. He hadn't expected anyone to be in there anyway.
He walks into the bathroom without bothering to close the door and glances down at his pale, maroon-streaked hands.
He had killed someone today. Maybe two years ago that would have disturbed him, but he is sure it doesn't anymore.
It had been a hunter-nin from Kirigakure—or at least he was pretty sure it was; he hadn't really looked at the shinobi. He had stabbed him. Right through the heart. Just... slipped his kusanagi sword up through the ribs and into the heart and before he knew it, black blood had been pouring down his black blade and onto his white hands. When he had slowly drawn the sword out of the man's chest (it had made a strange cracking sound), he had stared at his hands for a long moment before he had snapped out of it and jerkily wiped his hands and sword on the dead nin's shirt. Sasuke could have asked Kabuto or Orochimaru for directions to the bathroom when they had arrived at the new hideout, but he'd have much rather not.
Sasuke spins the rusty dial and after just a moment, frigid water splashes into the ugly plastic sink out of the faucet.
He thrusts his hands under the frenzied rush of water and some of it splashes up a little onto the dipped sleeves of his gi, but he hardly blinks as he watches the blood come off in pink rivulets and swirl down the drain.
He kneels next to the tatami mat and slowly rolls it back and there's the door underneath it and he stares at it for what must have been hours, studying the simple ring that he could fit his small hand around and pry the door away and he could go to whatever it is Aniki wants him to see.
When he finally opens the door it's quick and jerky, like he doesn't want to be caught.
He never will forget what he read down there.
After a while he looks back up at himself in the mirror, his hands stilling under the icy water and for what must have been hours he studies his reflection, noticing little details on his own face for the first time.
When he finally remembers to turn off the faucet it's quick and jerky, like he doesn't want to be caught.
He pulls his fist back and shatters the mirror.
He's quite pleased with the broken and distorted image presented to him and his bloody knuckles.
End Vanity