AN: Aww crap. Here I go again. This story is freaking dark, but you were already warned in the first chapter. There's a lot of interpretation on what Itachi did and why he did it. Is it right? I don't know, but I liked it as I wrote it so, here's my interpreted Itachi on why he did what he did. I really need to work on Cherry Picking.
Music of the Update: 3 doors down, seether, linkin park and my chemical romance
To Deadlydiva and Purpleshinigami my beloved betamuse and faithful reader = ) you should thank them for this chapter
PS. Fighter girl-Hyuuga: I listened to the song as I read through it again and I liked it. Thanks for sharing!
He shouldn't be doing this. There was nothing that he could do to justify his behavior should he be caught in the act. She served no point. She had no grand purpose, scheme, or example that he could make of her. She wasn't powerful, she certainly wasn't a genius or a prodigy. She had no kekkei genkai, she wasn't a jinchuriki. She wasn't even a target on their list of possible threats. She had no credible standing, her name and clan insignificant in the ninja world.
Weakness.
Should he be caught with her, things would become far more complicated. Sure he could twist the facts. If he needed to lie he could come up with something about her, some reason he kept her so very close, kept her hidden from their all knowing eyes; from his suspicions. There was always a story to be told, a reason he could come up with that they would buy should the need arise. He would keep her, and do what was necessary to keep her. Uchiha Itachi had absolutely no qualms with lying through his teeth.
For years, he had been taught, trained to kill, to lie, to steal, to murder, to assassinate without so much as blinking an eyelash. For his country he had been abused, physically, sexually, he had been tortured, raped in mind and soul. He was a tool, a weapon of destruction according to Konoha, according to the rules of men and the way of Ninja; the lifestyle of ninja. He had committed unspeakable acts of violence. Grown men, hardened men would have broken under the experiences that he had as a 13 year old boy, as an anbu captain. He had been covered in the blood of his enemies, forced to lay on the corpses of his victims he'd buried to avoid being caught. He'd assassinated children, tortured them when needed to.
To be in Anbu required one to do whatever it would take in order to complete a do as the Hokage bid, without word or question, without protest no matter how unsightly such an act might appear on a surface level. Anbu were not taught to question their superiors, their betters. It was war, which suspended all ordinary rules of combat. They were taught to do as they were told and to do whatever it took to accomplish such means to an end.
It was Weakness.
Anbu were silent stealthy killers, hunters, dogs of the Ninja heads designed in such a way to act as the hands and feet of the village administering justice given to them by the Hokage himself. Uchiha Itachi had been such a man. He had done his duty, had fulfilled his obligation to his country over and over and over again. He had done well over what was simply expected, had willingly committed such crass acts, done such unspeakable things in the name of the village, the kage who controlled justice. He had paid for his patriotism in the blood and flesh and bone of those he left behind in his wake.
He was the prodigy of his clan, the bright and bold future of the Uchiha that were plotting revenge whilst they used Konoha for it's resources and benefited from their fashionable status as administrators of justice, keepers of the very peace they were about to overthrow in the village. He was a genius, supposed to be the first to pave the way, to bring about a great and glorious future for the people of fire. The Uchiha simply wanted him, expected him to bring about that future for their own ideals. They placed their dreams on the shoulders of others, using them, disposing of them when their usefulness had been served. Itachi smirked as he thought back on it. Oh how idealism dies so very young.
It was such a privilege, such a great honor for one so young and so talented to be admitted into Anbu. Never mind his age, or his propensity for good. It didn't matter as ninja were tools to be used and discarded when they ceased to serve their purpose. His mother had never been so proud. She, who had been a ninja, a sub par ninja, who had never experienced the life of a cold blooded killer, had never witnessed true bloody battle first hand. His mother hadn't tarnished her hands with a child's blood, had never taken a life that hadn't tried for her own. His father had deliberately misled Mikoto on the glories of Anbu, though it hadn't taken much. She had supported Fugaku in the revolt against Konoha, after all. Blood was thicker than anything else in Mikoto's eyes; she had been a weak willed woman, happily led and easily deceived.
Anbu had never been graced with such a silent killer, a deadly boy without apparent emotion. Itachi, who was so far above all the other skills of the previous anbu members, that he made captain in a week after being admitted into Anbu. He wasn't merely top of his class, but top of any of the rookies he'd faced in his generation of ninja, going so far as to surpass most of the previous generation in his small amount of years. He wasn't just smart, but absolutely brilliant, gifted, with the mind of a god, able to strategize and see moves coming and counter attack without hesitation. His defense was absolute, his offense was better if such were actually possible. He was a terror, a monster of a boy by his teammates, because he was so contradictory. How could death come so swiftly in the hands of one so small? One who appeared so innocent as most young boys could?
He was always silent, rarely speaking, rarely needing to and that was part of their fear. They expected anger, terror, attitude. Itachi had none to give. The other Anbu members were terrified, horrified though they would never, could never say it directly to him. They didn't need to. Itachi could read the subtle unspoken emotions that flickered across their faces, in their body movements as if they were screaming to him, shouting it. It was apparent in the way they looked at him as he took off his mask. The way they watched him as he slaughtered people, men woman or children without a twitch, even a glimmer of regret in those blood red Sharingan. Even the fool of his own flesh and blood, his dog of a family member, who had been watching him since being admitted into Anbu, was awed, cowed by him.
Uchiha Itachi had commanded and demanded the respect of the Anbu operatives within a week of his arrival to the elite ninja group. Shisui had never seen anyone like him, and never would the rest of his short lived life. Uchiha Shisui, his best friend, loyal to the Uchiha, even above him, loyal to traitors above their own comradery. Itachi had saved Shisui countless times on their missions. They had promised to look out for each other and Itachi had fool heartedly believed such innocuous praddle.
If only Itachi had understood how true those words really meant in light of the situation. He had found it utterly ironic when he'd had to be the one to kill Shisui, lest the others learn of his secret mission. He had strangled Shisui himself, choked the life out of him to avoid his secret, his real mission from getting into the hands of his treacherous family. He'd dumped the body in the lake disposing of the evidence and creating his own. Whatever had been left of Itachi's innocence died with Shisui's death. Shisui's death had been the stepping stone, the start of the path that allowed him to kill his family.
And he had gained the Mangekyou because of it. It wasn't as if Itachi hadn't been aware of the ability before. He had never imagined he would gain such an unsightly ability in the way he had. But he would not be stopped now. He had come too far. He knew his mission, he was a tool, a device that would complete his kage's will. He would not allow the Uchiha to revolt. He would not let them sully the Uchiha name in history even if he had to kill every last one of them to do it. It was an order, but it had been a pleasure to serve justice. He had culled the clan, purging it of the power sucking, pathetic scheming leeches who lacked the nerve to declare war outright, instead of skulking in the shadows like the dogs they were.
It suited Madara to kill the Uchiha clan, to cull those who had sided with the dirty Senju and betrayed him originally. It was too late for them to find reason. They had already been dirtied, tainted by the Senju dogs, bought and bound by their hollow philosophy. No Madara would start all over, would create a new world order, would repopulate the Uchiha clan. And Itachi had sealed his fate, signing over his soul as he had made such a costly deal with Madara. It hadn't mattered that he'd made the deal with Madara because he was so disillusioned with what he had done, been forced to do in the name of justice that he would have left anyways. He had joined the organization Akatsuki in payment for Madara. He had helped create madness.
Uchiha Itachi was tired of being used, of being toyed with. People were more than tools, more than weapons to be used and tossed aside so easily. They had tried to train all the emotion out of him. They had nearly succeeded. When he had left Konoha Itachi had promised himself that he would become his own person. He would not be a tool of justice, he would find his own. Itachi answered to no one, gave no one any account. He choose his allegiances, did as he pleased, decided his own fate in life.
She was Weakness.
He shouldn't have started this between them. But it was hard to let go. Itachi had never indulged himself in anything. He never liked sweets, had never had a taste for candy or sugar. He was punished if he went after such things leaving him angry at the offending goodness that stood in his way. It became a matter of will, a matter of discipline to avoid such temptation. Not because they punished him, but because he could. He was a simple man with simple tastes. Then she had exploded into his world of grey, painting color and light in her wake. And he found he preferred her world of colors, her sweet taste to anything else he'd discovered.
And that was why he couldn't stop it. Oh they had tried. On both sides they had tried, though she would never know how many times he had lifted his kunai to her sleeping form and turned, unable to slay her while she murmured his name so reassuringly in her sleep. She had left several times, feeling like she had betrayed her village and he had been forced to kill the anbu members she'd brought into their little game, bring her back where he kept her secret, safe from her own world. So long as she thought he was toying with her, she would never know the truth of the situation, would never suspect that it was he who could not let go.
But it was inconsequential.
She was weakness, his weakness, the only uncertainty he allowed. Sakura was the only thing he had that didn't fit, or make sense in his world. She was the only exception. No one else. Only Her. His. She was his and he had made her his, ensured that she was his by breaking her himself. He had broken her until she could see none other than him. Even if she should leave now, even if she could muster the will to back out of this, on him, she would never be able to get his taste off of her. He had marked her soul. That knowledge left him confident.
He would not give her up to anyone. She was the first thing he had decided on for no other reason but himself. He had been forced into Akatsuki even if he had been disillusioned at the time and might have joined of his own accord. No one had forced him into this illicit love affair with her. He had willingly made the steps himself. Had willingly crossed the lines, blurred those lines between them. Itachi had so easily damned himself, damned her by involving her in his life. She was his flickering light, what kept his world from being consumed by the shadows, kept him from drowning in the flood of his victims. He clung to her because he simply couldn't save himself anymore. It was selfish of him. She would drown with him, they would drown together. His darkness would extinguish her flickering light plunging them both headlong in darkness unending.
Because she was His.
Even knowing all of this, he would not let her would not leave him. Or rather she could not leave him, he should say. It was too late to turn back now. She was incapable of it, so helplessly, hopelessly lost in him that she couldn't find her way back. He would not let her leave either, preferring their small amount of psuedo harmony to the truth of the world he lived in, the person he had been forced to become to keep his sanity. And so if Itachi had to lie, steal, kill, rape, torture, to keep her with him then so be it. It was only more of the same he had done his entire life, only this time he would do it because he wished it so, not because he was carrying out someone else's will.
She was his for the making, and his for the breaking.
And He was never going to let her go.