Disclaimer: I do not own the anime Naruto nor do I own Itachi or whatever other characters that happen to be mentioned in this story.
Truth
Chapter 14 – Darkness
"Darkness is only driven out with light, not more darkness."
A dream forgotten was one of the least things that were ever on Itachi's mind.
When he was younger, he had been very creative. He had also had a few quirks. For one, Itachi had always been very artistic, seeing beauty in things that had no significance to other people.
He used to arrange his food to look appealing before actually eating it. He loved just sitting down outside and staring at scenery. He would look for shapes that shadows made.
But he found it harder and harder to see the elegance of nature with eyes descending slowly into darkness.
But one thing he noted was that most of his past quirks had been passed onto his younger brother.
Itachi also knew he wasn't just copying him because Sasuke had these habits long before he knew Itachi did.
He had seen the look in his brothers' eyes as he stared at the nature. In fact, Sasuke had always loved going down to the lake just to watch the fish swim around.
These were all annoying habits that his brother no longer possessed. They stopped after he left Konoha.
But then Itachi couldn't be speaking because he no longer had these traits anymore, either.
Itachi had grown up being pushed into being a ninja. All Itachi had wanted to be as a kid was someone who brought peace without fighting.
All pretences of this dream had been promptly thrown out the window the moment he was enrolled into the academy. But even as he grew and flourished, he kept his ideals, still hoping he could bring peace without fighting.
As he grew older and older, his dreams slowly dimmed and dimmed until it was completely dark.
He had always been growing up in the darkness anyways.
Forced to kill to survive.
What a sad, sad world.
After he had joined the Akatsuki, he had seen more and more of the world.
He walked through towns filled with people with no homes, no food, and no way to survive. He saw the children die. He saw the adults cry and weep. And he could not do a single thing about it.
He saw towns under barrage and saw them collapse under the weight of the aggression being pressed on them.
He saw women being taken away, the men being killed, the children either being taken, killed, or left to die.
And he mourned.
He mourned for the lives he could not save. He mourned what could be.
And then he wished he could go back in time to pursue his dream.
But his life had been written before he had even been born. Written in the blood of his ancestors. His duty being first thing and his wants becoming second to everything.
And as he walked through the shambles of what had once been a rampant village, he found himself pushing through a world of darkness. And only one thing made him keep moving on.
Sasuke was his light in this world of darkness.