Broken

by DTmarley

Itachi always wanted to leave home. He finally gets the chance to go college away from his house and he takes the opportunity thinking that somehow he could live before he is forced into a life of his father's choosing. (Modern AU, TRIGGER WARNINGS: violence, blood, physical abuse, emotional abuse, verbal abuse, vomiting, death scenes)

1. Chapter 1

Chapter List

The First Day

Broken Statues and Oreo Cookies

Orochimaru Receives a Warning

A Halloween Scare

Bruises are Hard to Hide

A Visit From a Monster

Panic and Snowflakes

Drifting Away

No Longer an Older Brother

The First Day

He took a deep breath and pushed open the door to the science building. He had finally made it to college after years of studying and useless assignments, he had made it. He stepped into the building and took in what he saw: the shiny floors, evenly spaced lights hanging from the ceiling, a reception desk, a small coffee shop, and most importantly the other students. There were not many others so early in the morning and the ones that were there looked half asleep, all except one: a smaller guy with unnaturally pale skin and long stringy black hair. There was something about this guy that was off-putting, like he was looking for trouble.

Itachi sighed and walked towards a hallway to find his class, there were a lot of different kinds of people out in the world and he was good at avoiding most of them. His first class was biology, honestly 8 AM was far too early for something so boring and technical. He found the room, it was empty and he breathed a sigh of relief. He slid into the middle seat in the front row and pulled out his phone.

At almost the exact same moment his phone went off with a text message, it was from his little brother Sasuke, "Good luck with your first day big brother!" Itachi smiled, the hardest part of going to school away from home was having leave Sasuke right when he was starting middle school.

The door flew open making Itachi jump. One of the tired-looking students stomped to the back of the room, pulled out a laptop, threw his bag on the floor, and plopped himself into a desk in the back corner. The kid had longish gray hair and was wearing a weird circular necklace with a triangle on it. Another person Itachi felt he had to avoid.

The door opened again and more students started filing in and taking seats around the room. Itachi looked back at his phone and started to reply to Sasuke when someone dropped their bag onto the desk next to his and sat down. Itachi glanced over sideways and let out a slow quiet sigh, of course it was that pale guy. They made eye contact briefly and the pale guy gave a slight nod then started taking a notebook and pens out of his bag.

Itachi narrowed his eyes and then started to do the same, but when he opened his notebook something fell out and onto the floor under the pale guy's desk. He looked at it lying there, it was a picture flipped upside down with some words on the back. Itachi desperately wanted to see what it was and figure out how it had gotten into his books. He wanted so badly to reach over and pick it up, but he also didn't want the pale guy's attention. He slowly opened his notebook and pretended he didn't notice the picture on the ground.

"I think you dropped this." A voice came out of nowhere making Itachi jump. He looked over to see the pale guy holding out the picture to him. Itachi looked at it, he could see now that it was a picture of him and Sasuke at the beach from over the summer. "Is that your little brother?" the pale guy asked.

"Yeah… thanks." Itachi replied slowly and took the picture back. He flipped it over and read the messy words scrawled on the back of it. He half smiled, he was definitely going to miss Sasuke.

"I'm Orochimaru, by the way, Nice to meet you!" Itachi turned to look at him: he was smiling with his head tilted to the side, the long stringy hair had fallen back far enough so that Itachi could see that he had his ears pierced. He didn't look so creepy and odd from close up.

"Itachi." Itachi replied and held out his hand. Orochimaru looked confused for a second then shook hands with him. As he reached over his sleeve pulled up slightly and Itachi could see a snake head tattooed on Orochimaru's arm. Itachi didn't really know what to say next, so he just stared silently in Orochimaru's direction.

"Are you a biology major?" Orochimaru asked, clearly uncomfortable with the awkward silence.

"No, philosophy. I'm just trying to get some of my gen-ed classes out of the way."

"Oh," Orochimaru looked slightly upset by this, "So, why philosophy? That's kind of a useless field."

Itachi tensed his muscles. He clenched his teeth and resisted every urge to hit Orochimaru. He took a deep breath, relaxed, and replied, "Because I would rather be happy studying something I enjoy than be miserable studying something that I have no interest in. as far as after school is concerned, I already know what I am doing and all it requires is a degree of higher education."

"That's cool that you already know what you're doing!" Orochimaru seemed to have entirely missed the anger he caused by his question.

At that moment the door opened and a short girl entered, arms piled high with folders, papers, and a laptop. She walked to the front of the room and spread her stuff all over a long table. When she had finished this, she stood up and straightened her large glasses. "Hello! Welcome to biology 101 section 01, I am Dr. Ramona and I will be teaching this class."

Itachi almost choked, she looked like she was their age! How was this even possible? Itachi glanced over at Orochimaru about to remark on this, but Orochimaru just sat there with his mouth slightly open staring at the professor like she was the most incredible thing he had ever seen.

There was a snort from the back of the room, "you're kidding, right?" It was the kid with longish gray hair, "I didn't come here just to learn from some girl barely older than me."

Dr. Ramona let out a sigh and started up a PowerPoint presentation. "As I said, I am Dr. Ramona and I have been teaching for five years now. I graduated from this university when I was 12 with a bachelor's degree in biology and chemistry, received a Master's degree in genetics at 14, then received a doctorate degree for my research work in studying how genetic mutations are passed through generations. Yes, I am only slightly older than you, however, my class is not easy and you are free to drop it any time you wish," she paused and looked at the attendance list, "Hidan?"

Hidan did not reply and leaned back in his desk. He went back to looking at stuff on his laptop and it seemed like he didn't want to argue anymore.

The rest of the class went by in a whirlwind as Dr. Ramona sped through the first section of material on a basic introduction to biology. Itachi barely had time to think about anything aside from writing as fast as he possibly could. He was glad the class was only an hour long, if it had been any longer his hand might have fallen off from writing so much. Orochimaru seemed to be in the same state as he furiously scribbled down vocab words and examples and drew the diagrams that were on the board. However, he didn't look miserable, he looked elated and energetic. There is definitely something weird about him, Itachi thought.

"You have to read the first chapter for next class, don't even think that you can pass this class without doing the reading, some have tried and they all failed." Dr. Ramona calmly started putting her papers back into folders and packing up her laptop.

The class just sat there in shock. This was not something that they had expected to hear at 8 in the morning from a freshman level intro class. No one moved or said anything, they all just stared at their professor who was getting ready to leave. "Oh yeah, this class has a lab component, our lab time is Friday nights from 6-9 pm." Dr. Ramona added as she reached the door, "see you next class!" she smiled and waved then left the room of silent shocked students.

Slowly the shock seemed to slip away from the half-asleep group of students. There was a lot of muttering and cursing around the room as all the students packed up their stuff and got ready to leave. Itachi just silently dropped his notebook back into his bag and got up to go. He was about to walk away when he realized that he almost forgot the picture from Sasuke, he picked up off his desk and sighed, college was different from anything else he had ever done. Itachi got up and followed some other students out the door and down the hall.

"Itachi! Wait up!"

Itachi stopped. He knew immediately who it was and he almost kept walking and pretended not to hear it, but he would have felt guilty. He let out a resigned sigh and stopped in the middle of the hallway. Orochimaru ran up to him, he hadn't even put all his papers back into his bag and stood there clutching loose papers and holding his pen in his teeth.

"Do you have a class after this?" Orochimaru asked.

"Yeah, I have two more classes today then I'm done." Itachi replied, hoping that this would discourage Orochimaru from following him anywhere.

"Oh, nice! So do I!"

This caught Itachi off guard, he would have to try to sound busier even if he had nothing going on. This guy may not be as creepy as his first impression, but Itachi still didn't want to be making friends with anyone, it just wasn't something he did. "Oh…. Ok, maybe I'll see you around then." Itachi tried to brush off Orochimaru with a vague response.

"I have art history, I really didn't want to take it, but I guess it's required." Orochimaru continued walking next to Itachi matching his stride perfectly.

Itachi flinched, that was the exact class he had next. He wouldn't be avoiding Orochimaru very much apparently. He turned to say something about the importance of studying art but stopped before he got any words out, there was something… different about Orochimaru's eyes. And it wasn't the fact that he appeared to be wearing purple eye shadow, his pupils were vertical slits, like a snake's. Itachi blinked, maybe he was seeing things, and it was still pretty early in the morning. He checked again, they were the same.

"Itachi? Is everything ok?" Orochimaru was just staring at him, looking very confused.

Itachi snapped back to reality, "Yeah, I just… you… I… we have the same class next I think." Itachi felt his face flushing, lying on the spot was something he wasn't very good at doing. He looked away quickly and hoped that Orochimaru hadn't noticed.

Orochimaru was quiet for a few seconds, he knew exactly why Itachi was acting odd. Everyone did, it didn't matter if he was nice or not. He sighed, maybe this guy was no different from anyone else. "I think the arts building is this way." He said quietly, and they walked towards their next class in silence.

The rest of the morning they had class together and walked to class together and even ate lunch together. It was awkward though, there seemed to be an unspoken agreement that neither of them wanted to say anything. Itachi wasn't sure why this awkwardness had started, all he knew was that he must have said something wrong. This was why he didn't want friends, he always seemed to mess it up somehow, he couldn't help it if he saw more than other people; it was just the way he was born.

Itachi had finally gotten some time apart from Orochimaru and was heading back to his dorm to try and figure out everything that had happened that morning. It had been an overwhelming day between frantic note taking, having syllabi shoved in his face, and being around Orochimaru. He was glad he was going to be getting some alone time. He was one of the few lucky students who had been placed into a double dorm but his roommate had never showed up. He was glad about the extra space and having privacy. He stepped into his room and let out a deep breath, alone at last. He paused, something was wrong. Something was out of place.

There was movement in the corner, it slid across the carpet along the wall. It was a thin green rope, or at least it looked like one, only about a foot long. It was a snake. Why the hell was a snake in his room? was this some kind of joke? A prank from the older students? Itachi scowled and walked across the room and picked up the snake carefully, it squirmed a little but then relaxed and started to slither around his hand. He stared at it and smiled slightly, it may be a snake but it did have a cute face.

All of a sudden there was a loud knock at the door, and Itachi felt a slight panic, pets were not allowed in the dorms and now he had a snake casually wrapping itself around his hand. He put his hand behind his back and slowly cracked the door open. Orochimaru was standing there looking very distraught, almost like he had been crying.

"…yes?" Itachi asked, a little nervous he had hurt Orochimaru's feelings earlier and that now he would have to listen to an emotional rant from someone he barely knew.

"um, I was wondering if you could help me look for something… can I come in, I can't really… uh… talk about it where the RA can hear…" he looked up at Itachi, his eyes were wide and puffy and he sniffled a little.

Itachi sighed, then remembered the small snake that was still in his hand, he felt like he should keep it hidden, who knows what this guy might do if he found out that there was an illegal pet in the room. So he backed up and opened the door and let Orochimaru in while keeping his hand behind his back.

Orochimaru walked in cautiously, his eyes scanning the walls and book cases, then dropped to the floor and looked under the bed. This caught Itachi off guard and he just stood there looking slightly annoyed.

"Whatever you're looking for, I don't have it. Why would I take something from your room?" Itachi felt like he had to defend himself somehow and he could feel his temper rising quickly.

"Oh no! Nobody stole anything, something got out and now I can't find it and its lost and scared. I need to find it before it figures out how to leave the building and I never see it again!" Orochimaru sounded frantic and he started to move Itachi's desk away from the wall causing a stack of textbooks to fall to the floor and a cascade of photographs fell out of them.

Itachi just stared at the mess on his floor, half annoyed that Orochimaru was going through his stuff and half perplexed as to how so many pictures had been tucked between the pages of his textbooks without him noticing. "Hold on! Just tell me what you're looking for and I'll help, just stop tearing my room apart!"

"It's…. A s-s-snake…" Orochimaru stuttered, and he looked very embarrassed. "I know I can't have pets, but I couldn't leave it with my uncle, he doesn't know how to take care of her."

Itachi was hit with a sudden realization. "Oh, is this it?" he showed Orochimaru the small grass snake that was calmly resting on his hand, clearly enjoying itself. "It was in my room when I got back from class."

"Karin! You're safe! Oh thanks goodness!" Orochimaru ran over and very carefully picked up the snake and it happily started slithering around. He brought it up to his face and it gently licked the tip of his nose. "I thought I lost you, Karin. I'm so glad I found you!" Then he looked up at Itachi, and squinted, "She usually hates people, she tries to bite them even though she can't do much."

Itachi shrugged, "it….she… seemed pretty friendly." He didn't really want to tell Orochimaru that he was thinking of keeping the snake, for fear that Orochimaru might think that he was as obsessed with snakes as he was. "Do you know how she got out?"

"I must have forgotten to lock the lid down, she has a knack for opening things that aren't secured shut. She's so smart." He smiled at the snake like a proud father. "of course, I'll have to keep her more hidden so my roommate doesn't find her, he's a bit nosy, I already found him going through my stuff once."

Itachi nodded and started to pick up all the books that were now scattered across his floor. Orochimaru sure knew how to make a mess. He sighed and then started gathering all the pictures up, he guessed that Sasuke had something to do this. He smiled to himself, forgetting that Orochimaru was still in the room.

"You miss your little brother a lot don't you?"

Itachi was startled by the sudden comment, especially at the accuracy of it. "Yeah, I guess. He's pretty young but we used to hang out a lot." He didn't think that any of this was Orochimaru's business, and he especially hated telling people things that he considered personal.

"I wish I had siblings, but it's always just been me and my uncle." Orochimaru looked a little sad and he reached down and picked up one of the pictures. He stared at it a long time like he was trying very hard not to think about something. "Are those your parents?" he asked.

Itachi hesitated, he wanted to take the picture back but he felt kind of bad so he let Orochimaru hold it. "Yeah, that's from Sasuke's birthday last year." Itachi looked at the picture in Orochimaru's hands, remembering the day. It had started out so well. But of course, like most days, it had been ruined. The picture had been taken right before everything had gotten bad. They both stood in silence for a minute, both with their own thoughts.

Suddenly Orochimaru let the picture drop back to the floor and walked quickly to the door. He paused at the entrance, "thanks for finding Karin for me" he said in a quiet voice. And then he left and went back down the hall.

Itachi sighed and picked up the picture. It was odd, he could have sworn that he heard Orochimaru's voice crack a little bit when he was leaving. It could have just been his imagination, but Orochimaru seemed very sad. Even when he had been smiling back in biology, there had been something very sad underneath.

Orochimaru was a very odd person, he was pale and creepy looking, but seemed to be more friendly than most of the other people on campus. He also seemed to be unusually obsessed with snakes. And then of course, there was his eyes. His slanted eyes that had a large green irises and vertical slits for pupils, like he was part snake himself. It didn't really hide it the way he surrounded his eyes with purple eye shadow, but maybe he didn't want to hide it.

Itachi looked in the mirror that was inside his closet door. He looked at his face. The long straight lines that ran from the inner corner of his eyes diagonally to the center of his cheeks stared back at him. Not many people knew how those lines had gotten there, but it was a day he would never forget. He looked a little higher, he stared at his red eyes, the black symbols on the iris stared back at him. He squeezed his eyes shut, whenever this happened his eyes burned and stung. He fell to his knees clutching his face, he wanted to scream but that would attract attention. The pain was unbearable, the stinging felt like it was boring into his brain through his optic nerve. He couldn't handle it anymore and let out a very quiet yell and started hyperventilating, sweat started pouring down his face. He lay curled up on the floor with his hands clawing his at his eyes.

Orochimaru made it back to his room before the waterfall of tears started. He hated how much he cried. It was a side effect of his strange eyes, for some reason he would get slightly sad and then they would start tearing up. He put Karin back in her Aquarium that he kept in the bottom of his closet, then looked at himself in the mirror. He grabbed the side of the door and glared at himself. Why, why did he have to look this way? He gripped the door tighter and felt the wood cracking under the pressure. The sound made him feel better. Then he let go of the door and stepped back panting, he had to get himself under control. It didn't matter what people thought, right? He wasn't convinced. He screamed and punched the mirror, the glass shattering and cracking. He looked into the mirror again and saw his eyes multiply over the cracked surface. He backed away slowly and kept backing up until his back hit the wall, then he slid down and stared absently at the broken mirror. He rested his head on his arm and closed his eyes trying to imagine away what he had done. His right hand fell limp at his side, and blood starting to ooze out of cuts on his knuckles.

Orochimaru opened his eyes. It was dark in the empty dorm room, how long had he been asleep for? It was dark outside the window and the only light came in from under the door to the hallway. He looked up and saw the broken mirror, he sighed and got up and closed the closet door. He was lucky that his roommate hadn't come in and seen him like this. He felt hunger gnawing at his insides and realized that he hadn't eaten since noon. At least I have a meal plan, he thought.

He pulled on a jacket and a baseball hat and headed out of his dorm and down the stairs to leave the building. As he stepped outside it started to drizzle slightly. He sighed and let a small smile play at the corners of his mouth, there was nothing more comforting and cleansing than rain even if it was mostly fog. He walked slowly to the dining hall, enjoying every step and slowly all the thoughts of what had happened earlier slipped from his memory and by the time he made it to the door of the dining hall he was feeling much more like himself.

He walked inside the building and took in the warm glow of the lights and the smells of food, it felt very pleasant. After he got his dinner he walked into the seating area and started to look for a place to sit, there was a lot of seats by the windows that looked promising so he started walking in that direction. As he walked over he noticed a familiar figure sitting alone at a table facing out of the windows. Orochimaru was slightly relieved that he had found someone he knew and he started to walk over to say hello. But something was wrong. As he got closer he could see that Itachi was trying his best to cover his eyes and keeping them closed as much as possible.

"I-I-Itachi?" Orochimaru started, inwardly cursing himself for stuttering. "Would you mind if I sat here?" he continued quietly, he sensed that something had happened since he had found Karin in Itachi's room.

"….sure…" Itachi replied and started to scoot over but remained facing the window and didn't look at Orochimaru directly.

"Thanks," he smiled, trying to bring up the atmosphere. "The food looks good, I remember really liking it during my tour of campus. What do you think?"

Itachi didn't respond for a long time, "its ok I guess." then he slowly took a sip of his drink.

"Drinking coffee at night?" Orochimaru asked, attempting to be cheerful like he hadn't noticed anything was wrong.

"Tea, herbal, Chamomile." Itachi replied almost automatically.

Orochimaru couldn't stand it anymore, he hated seeing people upset. Even if Itachi was a private person he wouldn't let him lock everything away, especially if something was not physically alright. "Itachi. Are you ok?" He asked in a stern quiet voice.

Itachi was quiet for a while, and Orochimaru was starting to think that he had done the wrong thing and was about to leave the table. "I've been better, but it's nothing that hasn't happened before." Itachi said slowly, then turned to look Orochimaru full in face.

Orochimaru did not expect to see what he saw: around Itachi's eyes was red and swollen and there were small cuts across the bridge of his nose and at the corners of his eyes. It looked like Itachi had been crying or that he had wanted to pull his eyes out his own head. Orochimaru stared into Itachi's large black eyes, there was something more here, something not normal deep inside.

Itachi smiled a little, "what happened to your hand? Fall walking down the hallway?"

Orochimaru had completely forgotten about his bleeding hand. He looked down surprised and saw his hand was covered in dried blood and bruises were starting to form around his knuckles. "Oh, I didn't notice that…" he said, and slid his hand under the table.

"From the looks of it you must have punched something pretty hard." Itachi commented, taking a bite of dinner.

"The mirror had it coming." Orochimaru laughed and started to eat his food.

Itachi looked up at this and paused, "you should be more careful, next time wrap your hand before you hit something and you won't have as many cuts." Then he continued to eat calmly. There was something strangely comforting about not being the only one who had had a rough first day of class, it almost felt as if he had someone to look after. Like having a little brother again.

Orochimaru smiled at this, "I'll make sure to do that next time." It was weird, somehow Orochimaru felt that Itachi had accepted him. He wasn't sure when it had happened, but somewhere between finding the snake and now, something had changed and he didn't feel alone for the first time in a long time.

They both sat silently eating their food, this time there was no awkward silence, just a calm companionable quiet. After they finished they both walked back to the dorms and went their separate ways. Itachi returned to his room and started doing some reading then went to sleep shortly after. Orochimaru walked into his room, his roommate was playing video games so he decided to take a shower before doing his biology reading. He was too awake to sleep and there was a lot to learn at this new place. He came back from his shower and opened up the textbook to the chapter on ocular genetic mutations and started to read. There was a lot to find out about Itachi.

Broken Statues and Oreo Cookies

Orochimaru let out an aggravated sigh and slammed his face onto his textbook. There had been one week of classes and they were already studying for a major exam, as much as he loved biology this class was going to be the death of him. He groaned and went back to scribbling notes about cellular respiration. "Do you know the answer to the third question?"

Itachi looked up from his stack of papers, his long hair pulled back in a high bun, stray hairs were sticking out everywhere and he was holding a pen in his mouth. Itachi shook his head no.

They had been camped out in the library for three hours now, spending their Saturday trying to learn everything there was to know about the first chapter of the biology textbook instead of being outside in the nice weather. They were both frazzled and exhausted, Orochimaru's hair was half up and half down, the top half tied into a messy knot on the back of his head. They had taken over a back corner of the top floor of the library, electing to sit between shelves of books about biology instead of using the study room. There was almost no one on the floor so they could talk and study out loud and not be bothered. Or at least they thought.

There was a loud crash from the other side of the floor followed by a long string of cursing and shouting. Curious about the sudden uproar, Itachi and Orochimaru crawled to the end of the aisle and peeked around the corner. Hidan was standing there next to a pedestal that had once had a statue on it. The statue was currently broken in many pieces and lying all over the floor. Hidan was looking around frantically standing next to the mess.

He caught sight of Itachi and Orochimaru and started walking quickly in their direction. They stared at him as he got closer and closer to where they were studying. They scrambled back to their pile of books and papers and hoped that if they looked busy enough Hidan wouldn't want to join them. This was an incorrect assumption. Hidan walked up and threw his skateboard on the ground and sat down, leaning against a shelf.

"You guys studying for the test already?" Hidan smirked, "we've been studying the material all week, it's not that hard."

"It can't hurt to solidify the information in your memory, make sure you know what you need to for the exam." Orochimaru replied, flipping through the textbook in a vain attempt to find the answer to question three.

Itachi said nothing and tried to ignore Hidan sitting there. He didn't need another person to talk to, especially when he had to focus on studying. Hidan opened his bag and pulled out a pack of Oreos, "you need a study snack at least? Think of it as a 'we definitely didn't see you break anything' gift of peace." And he tossed the bag into the middle of the mess of papers.

Itachi and Orochimaru both looked up at the same time. They stared at the unopened pack of Oreos, then silently came to the agreement that this may be a good time for a study break. When Oreos were in the mix, no work was going to get done. Itachi sighed and put down his notebook then reached for the pack of cookies.

"Hidan, right?" Itachi asked, he didn't really want to start a conversation, but Oreos.

"Yeah, you're Itachi, I've seen you around. Didn't look like this much of a study bug from far away."

Itachi tensed, "well, I just actually care if my grades are good."

Hidan laughed, "my grades are good, don't know how but I ended up with great memory, I almost never study for anything."

"Ugh," Orochimaru made a disgusted noise, "I hate those kind of people, it's just not fair."

Hidan smiled and laughed even more, "hear that all the time, never bothered me in the past, won't start any time soon." He helped himself to an Oreo, "either of you guys like to skate?"

Itachi and Orochimaru stared at each other. Itachi started to say something but Orochimaru cut him off, "Nope, never have never will." He grabbed a stack of five Oreos, "kind of dumb, you could get hurt so easily."

"Not if you put enough time into it." Hidan shrugged but didn't bring it up again.

Everyone was quiet until the Oreos were gone, then Hidan stood up and picked up his board and his backpack, "well, I think I'm safe now. Nice chilling with you guys, good luck studying." And then he held out his hand for a fist bump. Itachi slowly fist bumped him, but Orochimaru didn't even look up from his textbook. Hidan shrugged, then walked away.

"Ugh" Orochimaru slammed his face into his textbook again. "We're never going to be done this review!"

"Well, we are close to finishing, we just need question three and we can go over it later if you want to take a break." Itachi was talking and writing at the same time.

"We need to do something, I hate being trapped inside all day."

"We could study outside?" Itachi was half joking, but he also was very concerned about the possibility of failing the class.

Orochimaru let out a tired sigh, he loved biology but he had his limits. He spent his days studying biology for class and keeping up with note taking and readings, and at night he was poring over articles and journals about hereditary ocular mutations. He did this research at night mostly because he couldn't sleep due to his roommate playing video games all night. He looked over at Itachi, what kind of eyes did he have?

"Orochimaru? Everything ok?" Itachi looked up and caught Orochimaru staring at him, this was an odd behavior and it certainly didn't go unnoticed. The more they studied together and hung out the more he seemed to be doing it. He was also looking more and more tired, the dark circles under his eyes seemed to be growing with every passing day.

Orochimaru snapped back to reality. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just a little tired of studying is all." He smiled and tried to laugh it off.

"You know, you've been looking more and more tired all the time, aren't you sleeping well?" Itachi was slightly concerned, he knew what lack of sleep could do to someone's body and psyche.

"Well…not really." Orochimaru replied. "My roommate does nothing but play video games at all hours of the day." He smiled so he could try and brush it off.

Itachi sighed, "Have you tried to talk to him about it yet?"

"Once I tried, but he wasn't able to pause the game…"

Itachi was quiet for a minute, he knew what he should say but he was loathe to do it. He needed his private space and having orochimaru around constantly was tiring. He never knew when he would have another episode and he especially didn't want Orochimaru to know about his eyes. No one knew except his family because they were the same. "If you need a new room to stay in, I have an extra bed." The minute he said it he regretted it, goodbye having any sort of sanity.

Orochimaru just stared back with wide snake eyes, did Itachi just offer him a new room? Did that mean they were friends? Why would he do this? Itachi had always been so cold and closed off, why would he offer? Orochimaru didn't know how to respond, "I-I-I w-would really a-a-appreciate that." He stuttered. "Karin likes you, so I don't think she would mind sharing a room with you."

Of all the things Itachi expected to hear, acceptance from Orochimaru's pet snake was not what came to mind. Even though he was slightly taken aback by this response he smiled, "maybe while we take a study break we can move your stuff over?" he was starting to regret it less. After all, hanging out with orochimaru reminded him of Sasuke and being able to take care of a little sibling.

While he was thinking about this he heard his phone go off, and it wasn't his normal ringtone, it was the warning ringtone. His smile faded and he clenched his teeth. He reached into his bag and pulled out his phone, he let it ring a few more times hoping that it would stop. Then he sighed with acceptance and answered, "Hello?"

Orochimaru noticed the sudden change in mood and watched curiously as he started packing up their study materials, when he was picking up Itachi's books another picture of Itachi's family fell out. Orochimaru looked up and saw Itachi's back was turned, so he slipped the picture into his own bag and then continued to clean up.

"Yes, I am aware." Itachi's voice was cold and short. He listened to the voice on the other end of the phone for a long time, and then his face turned red with rage, "No! Let him live as a kid! He is only in the fifth grade! If I find out that you started teaching him anything I am coming home and bringing Sasuke back with me!" Itachi was shouting into the phone now, and he knew he was dangerously close to triggering another episode. There was another long pause as Itachi listened to the voice again and his face went pale. "Yes sir." He said and hung up the phone.

Orochimaru, who had been watching the whole time, stood up and handed Itachi his bag. Itachi took it and then turned to leave without acknowledging Orochimaru. His face was incredibly pale and something was different; he started walking away quickly, then started running through the rows of shelves until he reached the bathroom. Orochimaru had been caught off guard and had to sprint to try and keep up with Itachi and he made it to the bathroom right as he heard the lock click. There was a long scream. Orochimaru heard something fall to the floor.

Panic gripped his chest, something was wrong and he had no idea what to do. Should he call for help? Should he wait by the door? He certainly couldn't leave Itachi alone. He sat with his back against the door and waited, listening just in case anything happened. He felt helpless but it was all he could do.

Itachi sat on the floor of the bathroom, it had been too close. He had felt his eyes start to change, the stinging and burning had started and he had made it to the bathroom just in time. He wanted to hit something, he was usually in control but there was something about his father that caused him to react violently. He didn't want Sasuke to become what he had, to be forced to work for the family business for the rest of his life. He sat with his back leaning against the bathroom door and leaned his head back. He was glad he could be away from his house for at least four years, but he knew he shouldn't have left Sasuke there alone.

"Itachi…" there was a quiet voice from the other side of the door. "I'm here if you need anything"

He had forgotten Orochimaru had seen everything. He would ask questions, anybody would, but Itachi wasn't going to say anything, it wasn't Orochimaru's business. He slowly stood up and picked up his bag, he checked the mirror. Nope, his eyes were their usual black, he took a deep breath to calm himself and prepare to pretend that nothing had happened. He slowly unlocked the door and opened it.

Orochimaru heard the door unlocking and quickly stood up, he didn't know what to expect, but he could at least be there. Itachi stepped out of the bathroom and gave him a weak smile. Orochimaru could see through it, but he played along and smiled back. They started to walk towards the stairs, but Itachi seemed to be weak and off balance. Wordlessly Orochimaru put a steadying hand on his shoulder.

They walked back to the dorms and started to move Orochimaru's things into Itachi's room, slowly Itachi seemed to return to his normal quiet and reserved self. They moved all the stuff pretty quickly and soon Itachi had a roommate and shared the secret of a pet snake named Karin.

Later that afternoon everything had returned to normal and the two of them decided to enjoy the warm September weather. They walked outside, planning on just relaxing in the sun somewhere but neither of them wanted to be near other people.

"I saw place behind the humanities building, there's some trees and grass and a parking lot that no one every uses." Orochimaru suggested

"Sounds good," Itachi replied and shifted his sketchbook and a large novel to his other arm.

They walked to the agreed upon place and saw that it was very isolated. Itachi smiled, this place was perfect and he would definitely have to come back when he was alone. They settled down under a tree and pretty soon Orochimaru had fallen asleep with a science article over his face and Itachi was in the world of his drawing. They were like this for about an hour when Itachi heard the sound of small wheels on pavement and he looked up to see what it was.

Hidan was skateboarding into the abandoned parking lot. He rolled over to the side and threw his backpack into the grass then started doing tricks. Itachi watched from over the top of his sketchbook. He hadn't gotten many opportunities to do things that normal kids got to do when he was growing up, and he was fascinated by the movement. He continued to observe silently and started doing quick sketches of the forms of the tricks.

Hidan must have felt someone watching him because he stopped and looked over at where Itachi and Orochimaru were sitting. He waved and Itachi hesitantly waved back, he didn't want to be noticed but it seemed like that was inevitable. Hidan walked over to where he was sitting and sat down in the grass next to him.

"Hey man! You finally stopped studying?" Hidan asked

"Yeah, we got kind of tired and it was just a really nice day outside." Itachi replied, quickly closing his sketchbook to hide the sketches of the skater kid.

"Nice! I try to be outside as much as possible, it's much more calming than being stuck in a building with books all the time." Hidan looked over at Itachi's sketchbook, "You like to draw?" he asked.

"Sometimes yeah," Itachi looked down at the closed notebook.

"What do you like to sketch?"

"People mostly, but I'll draw most anything that I find interesting, I just like to observe and to copy what I see as exactly as I can." Itachi replied slowly, he didn't really like talking about his drawings, they were mostly just exercises. He never did anything that he would consider art.

"Can I see some?"

Itachi hesitated, it was mostly filled with sketches of his family and their house, then recently he had been trying to draw Orochimaru's eyes, they were very complex and he had yet to capture them. "I don't really like to show people…"

"Alright, if you're not comfortable with it then that's ok." Hidan laughed and leaned back.

Itachi was puzzled, this kid had seemed so angry before, he had complained about everything in almost every class they had and never seemed to hang out with anyone. He constantly carried around his skateboard and almost always had headphones in like he was shutting out the world on purpose. But when they were talking he seemed so relaxed and calm, just really chill.

Hidan looked up from his phone at Itachi, "hey man, is everything ok? You aren't saying much."

"Huh? Oh, yeah, sorry, I was just thinking." His mind raced, trying to think of something to talk about since silence seemed to make Hidan uncomfortable. "So, how long have you been skateboarding?"

"Since middle school, not exactly sure why I started, but I'm glad that I stuck with it. I met most of my friends through skating." He paused, "none of them came here though" He sounded a little saddened by this, but he brightened up a second later. "Wanna see a trick?"

"Sure."

Hidan stood and went back to the pavement and did a complicated looking trick. Then looked back over at Itachi, "whaddya think?"

"Looks cool, and difficult." Itachi replied, he really didn't know what else to say, he didn't know much about skateboarding except that it looked pretty cool.

"One of my favorites," Hidan said walking back over. "You should try some time, it's a lot of fun, and you look like you're aren't just a book person."

This was unexpected to hear, most people couldn't tell because he wasn't bulky, but Itachi was required to stay as healthy as possible because it made his episodes easier to handle. "No, not just a book person. I haven't had time to exercise while here though." Between his classes and studying biology and philosophy he had been swamped.

"Bro, you should definitely try it then, I think you would pick it up fast. Mostly balance and foot position, come on," he stood up, "I'll show you some stuff, you're friend hasn't woken up yet and no one else is around."

Itachi shrugged, it couldn't hurt he supposed. He got up and followed Hidan to the pavement.

"First step on to the bolts, its balanced there so the board won't flip up. Good, now try pushing off slowly and then put your back foot back on to the bolts." Hidan stepped back and let Itachi roll and few feet until the board stopped. "See, not so hard!"

Over the next hour Itachi learned how to roll and turn and stop on the skateboard. It was essentially pretty simple, but it was also very difficult finding balance on a small piece of wood that was determined to not work with him. Hidan was pretty helpful and encouraging, though he did like to laugh at Itachi when he did something stupid.

Hidan checked his phone, "crap, I have to go," he ran over and grabbed his backpack and picked up his board, "see you around man." He said, then held out his fist for a fist bump.

Itachi reached over and knocked fists with him, "thanks for showing me some stuff."

"Anytime! See you in class!" he turned and started speed walking up to the sidewalk that went through campus.

What an odd person, Itachi thought and walked back to the tree where he had left Orochimaru. It was about time for dinner and he was hungry. He bent over to wake up Orochimaru when the article that he was reading caught his eye. He carefully lifted it off of Orochimaru's face and started flipping through it. There was stuff underlined and highlighted all over the place, one line in particular caught Itachi's attention: "Not all forms of ocular mutation are just for show. It is rare, but it has been seen in certain families these mutations cause the subject to obtain different kinds of visual powers. It is unknown whether these powers are safe or if they will have any sort of side effects."

Itachi dropped the article, and took a step back from where Orochimaru was sleeping. Who was this guy? Why was he so interested in ocular mutations that he would do extra research outside of class on it. A chill crawled up Itachi's spine, was it possible that he knew? He tried to get this thought out of his head, he could be researching his own eyes. Having the eyes of a snake certainly wasn't something normal.

Orochimaru opened one eye, then sat up quickly, "how long was I asleep for?!"

"About two hours."

"Wow, must have been really tired." He rubbed his eyes and let out a yawn, "man am I hungry though."

"I was just about to wake you, want to get some dinner?" Itachi started gathering his things together. He decided not to question Orochimaru about the article just yet, it didn't feel right.

The two started walking up towards the dining hall, the sun was starting to set and was filtering through the leaves that were just starting to change color. A mist was rising over the pond in the middle of campus. Under different circumstances Itachi would have slowed down and savored this walk, it was his favorite kind of weather and time of day. He glanced sideways at Orochimaru who was just walking along, he seemed not to notice the beauty of the moment. Itachi looked down at the path, the sun was almost down and as the darkness crept over the campus his thoughts returned to Orochimaru's research. The words he had read haunted him. Side effects were unknown. He shivered. A sense of foreboding settled on him as they entered the cheery dining hall, something was weird and he needed to figure it out.

Orochimaru Receives a Warning

It was about the middle of October on a Saturday morning. Orochimaru opened one eye, then let out a yawn. He loved Saturday mornings. Unlike Itachi, who woke up every morning extra early for absolutely no reason whatsoever, he enjoyed sleeping late. He looked over at Itachi's bed, it was already made neatly with the blankets pulled perfectly flat and the pillows arranged in the most organized way possible. Oh yeah, this was the day Itachi had to go on a trip with his philosophy class, Orochimaru remembered. It was going to be a pretty quiet day then.

He sighed and sat up, he looked out the window and saw that it was a fairly overcast day. The leaves were bright orange against the dark gray clouds. He saw a breeze rustle the leaves of the trees around the quad and a lonely crow flew over campus. It seemed like a nice calm day to get things done, Orochimaru smiled.

He quickly got up and messily pulled his blankets towards the head of his bed then changed out of his pajamas into black jeans and purple t-shirt. He went over to the mirror and carefully applied purple eye shadow around his eyes and put in his earrings. Then he grabbed a sweatshirt and his backpack and headed out the door. This was one his rare days when he could do his private research in peace, of course after he saw Dr. Ramona at office hours, the current chapter was difficult, even for him. He was a little nervous, she was so young and pretty, so accomplished already. It kind of made him think that he hadn't done anything with his life. He sighed as he walked to the science building, he could get food after.

He reached the building and walked in. there had to be an elevator nearby somewhere, he started walking towards the hallway past the reception desk when a voice stopped him, "is there any room I can help you find?"

Orochimaru looked down, at the desk where a student with large round glasses was sitting, he looked bored. "Well," he paused, "can you tell me where to find the elevator?"

The student snorted, "what, never used it before?"

"No…" Orochimaru was unsure if he was being mocked or if this kid was just mean in general.

"It's down the hall to your right, there are signs everywhere, not sure how you missed them." The kid leaned back and sneered at Orochimaru.

Orochimaru turned to leave, he didn't have time for stupid people and there were more important things t-

"Don't get too lost snake eyes."

Orochimaru stopped. "What. Did. You. Just. Call. Me."

"Did I stutter?"

Orochimaru didn't really know how to respond to that, he really wanted to hit this kid, hard. But that would cause problems, he could try to brush it off but he already lost that option by responding. Stupid stupid stupid, he thought, I should know how to ignore this by now. "whatever." He said and started walking again, he slowly clenched and unclenched his fists. Ignore it, just let it go.

He reached the elevator and got on as quickly as possible. He tried to forget about what happened, he needed to put his attention on science and more importantly learning about ecological formulas.

The elevator dinged and Orochimaru exited onto the fourth floor and found Dr. Ramona's office, he cautiously knocked on the door.

"Come in!" a pleasant voice yelled from inside the room.

Orochimaru relaxed, her voice was so mellifluous and smooth, and it even made listening to lectures bearable. He slowly turned the knob and opened the door.

The office was wall to wall bookshelves. Except there seemed to be more books on the desk and floor than actually on the shelves. There were textbooks piled on the desk, journals in stacks in various parts of the room, and some scientific books just haphazardly scattered throughout. The shelves were covered in everything from the assembled skeletons of small rodents to plants to random pieces of paper. The only shelf that seemed to be organized and clean was one shelf on the top of the bookshelf behind the door, it was tightly packed with very old looking books that were decorated and had very old gothic script down the spines.

"What can I help you with Orochimaru?" Dr. Ramona asked, she was sitting in a desk chair at a desk with a computer and almost every species of potted cactus. "This chapter is difficult math-wise, I'm surprised I haven't seen more students."

"How many have you seen?" Orochimaru asked, feeling a little uncomfortable in the menagerie of an office.

She thought for a moment, "only you."

Orochimaru nodded, then stepped further into the office.

"Oh! Here," she moved a stack of books off of an ancient looking chair, "you can sit here."

During the next hour, she talked Orochimaru through using the formulas and told him everything he needed to know about how the formulas had been created and then coached him through some examples. The hour flew by as he started to understand what they had been learning, math had never been his strong subject.

"And that should prepare you for the next exam." Dr. Ramona leaned back and put her feet on her desk. "Did you have any more questions about the material?"

Orochimaru was about to say no, when an idea came to mind, "what do you know about hereditary ocular mutations? I have a small research project I'm doing for….another class, and I feel like I have run out of articles to read on it."

Dr. Ramona gave him an odd sideways glance, "there isn't really much on the topic since it's a fairly new area of study, though these mutations have been around for centuries. May I ask what class this is for?" she raised a questioning eyebrow.

Orochimaru started to blush, "w-well, uh, i-i-its a-a-actually is a b-bit m-more of-f a p-personal p-p-project…." He silently cursed his stutter.

Dr. Ramona seemed like she wanted to ask more, but instead she said, "I have some articles you might not have read, some stuff that I wrote if you want to take a look at it. Just make sure you bring it back when you're done." She stood up and pulled three stapled packets from off one of the shelves then reached under a stack of books and pulled out the one on the bottom.

Orochimaru smiled, "thanks! I'll take good care of them!"

"A warning Orochimaru, this is a new area of study because the people who have these mutations are very secretive and very private. They don't want the whole world knowing their secrets. Stay safe and try not to tell a lot of people what you are researching." Her face was very serious when she said this.

Orochimaru nodded. He got the feeling that Itachi was very private about his eyes, and that if his family found out they would not be happy some random stranger knew about it. He stood up to go and Dr. Ramona opened the door for him to leave.

"If you find out anything new, please tell me about it! I would love to hear what you think about my articles and just your general thoughts on the topic!"

"I will! See you in class!" Orochimaru responded, then walked back towards the elevator. He slipped the new sources into his bag quickly so no one would see them. He took the elevator back down to the lobby and was leaving when he heard an unfortunately familiar voice.

"Oi snake man, don't get lost in the tall grass."

Orochimaru growled but kept walking, he wasn't going to give this guy the satisfaction of a reaction twice. He walked out into the cloudy day and relaxed, now he could do whatever he wanted to. Food first, he thought. He had skipped breakfast and was really starting to regret that now. He was also kind of missing Itachi, he didn't realize how much they hung out until he had to go through his day alone.

After he got his food he decided to eat near the TV in the hopes that something good was playing. He sat down and started eating and watching, it was the news, not too thrilling. He pulled out the picture of Itachi's family that he kept in his bag, he still felt kind of bad for taking it. He stared at it, Itachi's family was all sitting around in what he assumed was Itachi's backyard. They looked so happy, the parents, Sasuke, though not Itachi, but he never looked happy.

He put the picture down and sighed, it was something he never had: a family. He flinched. Memories of his parents pierced his brain, it hurt when he thought about them. He felt tears coming and he squeezed his eyes shut in a vain attempt to stop them. In the blackness behind his eyelids he saw his parents, their bodies were on the ground blood was slowly staining the carpet around them. He saw himself, only about two years old, just old enough to remember the scene.

He opened his eyes quickly and could feel the tears running down his cheeks. He quickly put the picture into his bag in a pocket where he wouldn't see it. He wiped his face on his sweatshirt sleeve and pulled out an article to read while he finished eating. Science didn't have emotions, he could always rely on it to make himself feel better.

As he read his mind kept going back to the picture, the smiling faces, and the family all sitting around together. He began to feel a hole in his chest, a deep dark lonely hole. He thought about his uncle, he didn't really miss him very much, they weren't close. He had always been encouraged to study his interests, so he studied, that was all. His uncle had never gotten over his sister's death and had never been able to be much in the way of a "loving parent" to him. He shook his head, he needed to stop thinking about this.

He quickly finished his food and got up to leave. He had heard about a movie being shown on campus sometime today, maybe he would go to that. He was walking back towards the dorm when he saw Hidan skating the other way down the sidewalk.

"Orochimaru! Hey!" he stopped and stood in front of Orochimaru's path.

"Hey." He had gotten used to Hidan by now, since he hung out with Itachi in their room every once in a while.

"Are you busy right now?" he asked.

"Well I was just about to- "

"Great, I need your help with something." Hidan said quickly grabbing his arm, then he ran off leading, Orochimaru towards the dorms.

When they reached the building Orochimaru was out of breath and very angry. "Hidan! What's your deal? I have better thi-"

"Look I just need help with something, ok? After you can go and do whatever you want. I just need like, maybe 10 minutes at the most." He looked at Orochimaru with big pleading eyes.

"Fine." Orochimaru sighed, the faster this was over the faster he could go do research. "What do you need?"

"I need you to help me get a girl's attention."

Orochimaru blinked, this was not something he knew how to do. "Um… I'm not sure if-"

"bro, you don't need to do anything, just stand there and when I start to talk to her try and keep the conversation going and ask me interesting things about myself." Hidan looked around Orochimaru frantically, "she's coming, quick, look casual." And he shoved his hands into his pockets.

Orochimaru just stood there frozen, what should he do? What was casual? "So Hidan, you like skateboarding?"

Hidan gave him an angry look, "she already knows that!" he whispered. Then he turned as a girl about his height came closer. She was wearing skinny jeans and a graphic T shirt with sneakers. She had headphones on and seemed not to notice either of them.

She noticed Orochimaru and stopped, "Hey man, those are some sick contacts! Where did you get them?"

Orochimaru was confused, he didn't know how to respond. Contacts? He thought, then remembered, "oh, its natural." He said, mentally bracing for the usual repulsion.

"That's sick, man!" then she seemed to notice Hidan, "hey Hidan, what's up?"

"Just about to head over and get some food. You wanna come?" He answered casually.

"Hm, I'm supposed to be meeting someone already, but I don't think he'd mind if you came along!" she smiled.

Hidan blinked a few times, he wasn't prepared for that answer. "Ok, sounds good. He a close friend or something?" he played it cool, hiding his disappointment with calculated questions.

The girl laughed, "oh gosh no. not close, he's my lab partner, we have an assignment due Monday." Then she turned to Orochimaru, "I'm Anko by the way, and I really do think your eyes are awesome, mine are just boring and brown and it gets old really fast."

"Orochimaru." He replied, then blushed slightly. No one had ever complimented him on his eyes before.

"See you later man!" Hidan said, and walked away with Anko.

Orochimaru watched the two of them walk off and shook his head. People were really odd. He walked back to his room and decided to shower before he did anything else since the bathroom would be relatively empty this time of day.

He stood under the stream of hot water and tried to forget about earlier. It usually worked when he thought about his research, but since it was about Itachi, all it did was make him think about the picture and eventually his parents. He stepped out of the shower and wrapped a towel around his waist and started to comb out his hair in front of the mirror. He had a weird feeling that he was being watched, he looked around but he was the only one in the bathroom. He walked back to his room and threw on athletic shorts and another t-shirt, may as well be comfy while he studied.

There was a knock on the door. He looked over and saw that someone had slipped an envelope under the door and he got up and walked over to see what it was. He picked it up and opened the envelope, all that was inside was a sticky note with the words "behind the science building, 9:30".

Orochimaru squinted at the sticky note. This was cryptic and definitely couldn't be anything good. He was curious though. He closed the envelope and put it on his desk, he still wasn't sure if he should go or not, but he would have to decide later. This was his time to get some serious reading done before Itachi came back and asked what he was reading.

A few hours passed and he had finished the reading material given to him by Dr. Ramona, it had been very helpful and he had taken lots of notes. It was almost 10:00 now and Itachi still wasn't back. This made Orochimaru a little worried, he said he wouldn't be back too late, but he was still uneasy. He started picking up his study materials and hiding them in the back of his closet. He went back to his desk and noticed the envelope.

There was a knock on the door, and he dropped the envelope in surprise. Someone started banging on the door, and he walked over hesitantly. "Who's there" Orochimaru shouted, he didn't want to open the door, he sensed that danger was near and he couldn't shake the feeling.

"Open the door snake eyes."

He froze. That kid from earlier. What did he want? To call him more names? "Go away or I'll call the RA." He was pissed off, but he wasn't stupid, that guy from earlier looked bigger than he was and he wasn't about to throw himself into anything dangerous.

"Oh really? Do you think the RA would be on your side if I told her you had a snake in your room?" the voice sneered.

Crap. Someone had told. His mind immediately jumped to Hidan, but then he shoved that thought to the side. Hidan didn't know, only Itachi knew. But Itachi wouldn't tell anyone, he barely talked to anybody. He tensed his body, "you don't have any proof of anything unless you admit you've been in another student's room without permission, and that's trespassing."

"If you want to talk more about breaking rules in the dorms, I could just show the RA the broken mirror in my room."

Orochimaru breathed in. the mirror. He had forgotten all about it. Who was this guy, it wasn't his old roommate, that kid barely did anything aside from play video games. He slowly walked toward the door, he dreaded whatever was going to happen next. He really hoped Itachi would be back soon.

He opened the door and the guy from the reception desk was standing in front of him. He had guessed right about this guy being taller, his eyes were even with the guy's collar bone. The guy was very tall and covered in lean muscle. He had large circular glasses and medium length dark gray hair pulled back into a ponytail.

"I don't believe we've met, my name is Kabuto and this is supposed to be my room." He scowled down at Orochimaru who just scowled back.

"You never showed up, besides, you still have a place to sleep. Grow up and get over it." Orochimaru replied and scowled deeper. A second later he realized that he probably shouldn't be rude to someone almost twice his size.

Kabuto reached down and lifted Orochimaru by the collar of his shirt. "I don't like you. You look like a creep and you're in the room that I am supposed to have."

"Put me down." Orochimaru kept his voice steady. If this guy thought he'd never had to deal with bullies before, he had another thing coming.

"Make me, snake eyes." Kabuto replied and slammed Orochimaru's back into the wall of the hallway.

Orochimaru coughed and struggled to breath, this guy was really strong. "Keep your hands to yourself." He managed to say, though it was hard to sound threatening when you can barely breathe.

Kabuto let go of Orochimaru's shirt and watched him slump over against the wall. "You're an odd guy, really into science and what else? Oh yeah. Other people's lives." He held up the picture of Itachi's family that Orochimaru had kept. Then he put the picture in his back pocket, "thanks to you, I have more information about your roommate than I could have ever gotten if I had been his roommate." Then he punched Orochimaru in the stomach.

He felt like had had been hit with a truck. He could have sworn he was standing up but the carpet was getting really close to his face. He tasted blood in his mouth. Then he saw another pair of shoes, black skate shoes. He heard a different voice and he tried to pick himself up to see what was going on.

"Back off."

Kabuto turned around and a guy was standing behind him. He was shorter and was carrying a skateboard. Kabuto sneered, "what are you gonna do about it shrimp?"

He didn't say another word, there was the sound of someone getting hit, then another and another. Hidan stood looking down at Kabuto who had one hand over his face trying to stop a bleeding nose and another holding his ribs. "If I ever catch you bothering him again, next time you won't be able to stand up. Got it?" Hidan's face was serious.

Kabuto scrambled to his feet and started to run down the hallway. He turned back and yelled, "I won't forget you! Next time I'll be ready! And you won't be able to walk, punk!" then he disappeared down the stairs.

At that moment, Itachi came round the corner and saw Hidan helping up Orochimaru. He stopped and his mouth dropped open, "what the hell happened!" he ran over and helped Hidan carry Orochimaru back into the room.

"Not sure what it was about, I'm just glad I was thinking of stopping by." Hidan said.

Orochimaru wiped his mouth on his sleeve but stayed quiet. What was there to say? He couldn't tell them anything without revealing what his research was and that might cause even more problems. "It was nothing." He said, then started climbing into bed.

Itachi was quiet for a while and he stared at Orochimaru, he knew it wasn't nothing. Perhaps he wasn't comfortable talking about it in front of Hidan, maybe he would never find out. He sighed, "Alright, just let me know if you have to go see a doctor." Itachi turned to Hidan, "thanks for all your help and for protecting my friend."

"It's no problem, he helped me out earlier today." Hidan said, then walked towards the door. "Goodnight."

As Hidan left, Itachi started to get ready for bed. He wanted to question Orochimaru, but that would have to wait. If Orochimaru was in some kind of trouble, he wanted to help him out. He didn't know how he would, but he could at least teach Orochimaru how to defend himself.

Orochimaru stared at the wall, Itachi had called him his friend. What was that supposed to mean? Did he have to tell him about his research and the stolen picture now? He'd never really had friends before, and he didn't want his first one to be based on lies. He remembered Dr. Ramona's warning about not telling anyone what he was looking into. Something Kabuto had said stood out in his mind, that he had given more information, did this mean that people were following Itachi? He tried not to think about it now. He closed his eyes and fell asleep almost instantly.

A Halloween Scare

There was an odd buzz around campus when Itachi and Orochimaru got out of biology. There were small paper ghosts taped all over the walls, pumpkins and jack-o-lanterns in random corners, and candy everywhere. Nothing said Halloween like an entire campus collectively obsessing over ghouls and monsters with sugar on the side. The dorms were even worse, there were streamers and fake cobwebs spread all over the walls, on doors, in front of windows, and on the carpets. Fake spiders were glued into random places like toilets and unsuspecting bookshelves. No one really knew who was responsible for all of it, it had just slowly happened throughout the week leading up to Halloween. Itachi sighed as he pulled more fake cobwebs off the doorknob to his dorm, at least nothing happened to the inside of it. There was still an illegal pet snake in there after all.

Itachi and Orochimaru walked into the dorm and slammed the door shut. All their other classes had been canceled, of course not Dr. Ramona's class. And they still had to go to lab hours that night.

"I don't understand all this fuss," Orochimaru let out a sigh and flung himself face down onto his bed. "You can buy candy any time of year, why does everyone care about it now?"

Itachi hung his sweatshirt up in the closet, "well, it is a holiday. It's based on the traditions of the-"

"I don't actually care." Orochimaru groaned from the bed. He had already been asked at least ten times during the day if he was already in costume and he was losing patience fast.

Itachi shrugged and watched three pictures of his family fall out the closet from some unknown location. He had been finding them for months now, it looked like Sasuke had taken every single picture from their house and hidden it somewhere in his clothing, bedding, books, and stuff. "At least we have lab hours so we can avoid all the craziness."

"One small relief."

"A bit dramatic don't you think?" Itachi laughed and sat down on his bed.

Orochimaru just glared across the room, then slammed his face back into his pillow. "I suppose that you took part in this holiday growing up and are going to drag me into all the revelry."

"Actually no." Itachi was quiet, "it wasn't really safe to." He didn't elaborate, and got up to grab a book off the shelf, another picture floated down to the floor. "We have some time to kill before lab, are you gonna do any work?"

"No" Orochimaru said into the pillow, "I just wanna sleep until it's all over."

There was a knock at the door. Then there was a giggle and then pounding against the door.

Orochimaru rolled his eyes, "great, just who I wanted to see." He stayed in bed and started to pull the blankets over himself.

Itachi got up an opened the door, "hello Hidan, Anko." He nodded in their direction.

Before he could get any more words out, Hidan shoved him out of the way and burst into the room dragging Anko behind him, "we have got the best idea for costumes for the Halloween party!"

"Get out!" Orochimaru yelled from under his blankets, "don't bring that awful holiday in here!"

"Don't be silly Oro!" Anko smiled and pulled his blankets back, "it's a wonderful holiday and you're participating."

"Anyways," Hidan continued, "you can't skip the Halloween party. Everyone is going. And Anko already picked out your costumes so we can all go together!"

Orochimaru reached over and snatched his blankets away from Anko, "we have lab tonight Hidan, until nine, remember?" and he once again hid from the other three.

"He's right you know, we can't just blow off lab for a holiday. We have bacteria cultures growing and we have to check on them." Itachi was desperately trying to think of excuses, as much as he liked hanging out with Hidan and Anko, he wasn't a party person.

Hidan looked at him like he had five heads. "Are you kidding me Itachi? Bacteria? That's your excuse?" he shook his head, "fine. We go and check the bacteria and then you come to the campus party. We can all go together."

"And I'll meet you there!" Anko chimed in, as if that made it so much better. "Now as for costumes, Hidan and I are all set. He's going as a bounty hunter and I'm going as a pop star. And for you" she stepped closer to Itachi and pulled something out of her backpack then jumped up and put it on his head before he knew what was happening. "You are going to be a cat!"

Itachi just stared back wide-eyed. He could feel his cheeks getting red. "Um….I don't think that-"

"It's ok, I have a tail and a small bell you can wear too!"

Itachi went quiet again. This was not what he had expected when he thought about Halloween costumes and scary holidays. He started to plan ways of ditching Hidan before he got to the party.

Anko turned to Orochimaru who was still hiding under his blankets, "and you," she paused, then smiled. "You are going to be a ghost!"

There was a long angry groan from under the covers as Orochimaru heard this.

"See! It's perfect! All you need is a sheet and no one will even know who you are."

"How come he gets to be something where no one will know who he is?!" Itachi cut in, "everyone is going to know exactly who I am!"

Anko turned and smiled evilly in his direction. "That's because we want them to, girls like you Itachi and if you are covering your face none of them will talk to you. And it's even better if you're something cute, that way they will think you are way cuter than you already are."

"but" He started to argue back, " I don't have time for this nonsense, there are vocab words to be memorized and grades to be maintained and I don't want another person who is going to distract me from what I came here to do: study!" He hadn't realized he was shouting until he stopped and noticed that all three of them were just staring at him.

"I-Itachi, I think that's the loudest I've ever heard you say anything…" Orochimaru looked a little scared, Itachi had always been so stoic and quiet that it was really odd seeing him react to something so emotionally.

"I just really don't want to be a cat." He said quietly and reached up to take the cat ears off his head.

Anko slapped his hand. "No! Itachi, all you ever do is study and hang out with Orochimaru, you need to live a little. Oro is going, you can to. And you will be the best and most adorable cat at the party." Anko was nice but insistent.

Itachi sighed, there was no getting out of anything when Anko was around. She was nice and friendly and really chill, but between her and Hidan there had been a lot of adventures that could have been avoided. There was the time they had all gotten in trouble for swimming in the lake, and then setting the biology lab on fire which, in all honesty had been Orochimaru's fault.

Hidan and Anko left to go get ready and chill before all the craziness started. Itachi and Orochimaru just stared at each other, just 20 minutes earlier they had decided they would avoid Halloween as much as they could and now they had just gotten dragged into going to a party, and to make it worse: in costume.

Throughout most of the rest of the day Itachi did some reading for class and avoided thinking about the party as much as possible. Orochimaru asking about him celebrating Halloween had reminded him of how his family had spent it: at his dad's office, they would order pizza and his mom would try to make everyone as cheerful as she could in a dark cold office building. His dad would just work, he was at his office so why not. He would usually have to keep quiet and not disturb his dad, so he would read and draw. When Sasuke had come along it had gotten a bit more fun, they would play tag and hide and seek as long as they were quiet and didn't disturb anyone. He blinked and came back to reality and refocused on his textbook.

Orochimaru decided to go on a walk and do some of his research in the library. He had come across a lead connecting ocular mutations to geographical location and he wanted to look into it more. When he got to the library he searched some books on the school catalog then went up to the science section to find what he was looking for then wandered over to geography and grabbed some atlases. He grabbed an individual study table and immersed himself in his research. He had gotten so enveloped in reading that he didn't notice a large figure come up behind him.

"Hello snake eyes."

Orochimaru jumped up got ready to throw his book, "What do you want." He snarled.

"Calm down, just saying hi." Kabuto leered. "I don't see your friends around right now, guess you're all alone."

Orochimaru smiled sideways, "Oh yeah, because it's not like any loud noise in a library isn't going to attract any attention. Now, leave me alone before I yell 'fire' and get us both in trouble." He knew he wasn't going to be an equal match physically, even if Itachi and Hidan had shown him a few things. It wouldn't be enough, not yet anyways.

Kabuto took a step back and put his hands in the air like he had done nothing wrong. "Chill out snake eyes, I was just saying hi." He started to back away.

Orochimaru slowly sat back down and went back to his reading. He would have to deal with Kabuto sometime, just not today. At some point he would have to figure out what this guy wanted with Itachi and try to do something about it. No one, absolutely no one spied on or plotted about his friend without going through him first. Itachi had been nice to him, and he was not going to let that get repaid with sneaking around helping creeps like Kabuto.

He looked at his watch, he had been in the library for about three hours. It was quiet today, since everybody was out getting ready for that night. There were a few other students quietly reading or doing work, but even they were rushing through assignments to make sure they had nothing to do tonight. Orochimaru sighed, what was so great about wearing costumes and being stupid? He really didn't get people sometimes.

"Orochimaru?"

Orochimaru almost jumped out of his skin. He jumped up and turned around to see Dr. Ramona standing behind his chair with her arms full of books. If he hadn't known any better he would have thought she was another student: she was wearing a green t-shirt that read "Loki Charms" and skinny jeans with sneakers and a black hoodie. "H-hello… D-dr. Ramona." He managed to get out.

"I don't remember assigning that much reading in class, is this," she looked both ways and stepped closer, "your other project?"

Orochimaru blushed, "Y-yeah, I-I had s-s-some th-thoughts a-and w-w-wanted to l-look into i-i-it." he cursed himself again for stuttering, it always happened when he got embarrassed or caught off guard.

"Oh? What are you looking at? Mind if I join?" Her face seemed to light up at the thought of doing more research and looking at it from a different angle.

"S-sure!" Orochimaru smiled a little, he liked the idea of a study partner. And she was really pretty… "Let me make some space!" he cleared a section of the table off and pulled up a chair.

"Thanks! Now, what was the angle you were looking at?" Dr. Ramona settled down and started looking over his notes and books.

Hours flew past as the two worked together and created a comprehensive map of ocular mutation by geographical location. They seemed to not be distracted by anything as they took turns poring over books and then marking the maps with sticky notes. Dr. Ramona knew a lot about the mutations and how they were passed which was very helpful to have as a resource.

"Hold up." She tapped Orochimaru on the shoulder, "this location, that's this area. Well, this state anyways. Which mutation did you have for this one?"

Orochimaru grabbed a book from under the pile and flipped through the pages, "unknown, side effects unknown, rumored to be very powerful." He read a few more lines, "it is rumored to be a trait of a powerful mob family but there is no proof. Just a lot of mysterious deaths."

Dr. Ramona started chewing on her pen, "there are a few known gangs in the area that are relatively powerful." She continued to think. "Orochimaru, I need to ask you stop researching this for now."

Orochimaru looked over suddenly, he hadn't expected to hear that.

"you seem to be on to something with the geographical location lead, but in light of this new evidence I don't think it's safe for you to continue." She looked at him straight in the eyes, "I know what happened a few weeks ago. I can't allow this to continue if you are going to get hurt."

Orochimaru looked down, "I can't just stop. I need to do this research, I need to do it to protect someone. I'm sorry, but I acknowledge your warning, but I can't stop now." He looked back at Dr. Ramona, his jaw was set and he slammed his fist into the table.

She flinched, she recognized a lot of the same determination that she had when she had first started looking into this when she was 14. It had been fine until her research partner ended up in the hospital with both his eyes missing, the message had been clear: you don't mess with something that you have no business knowing.

Orochimaru checked the time on his phone, "crap I have to go eat before lab! Thanks for helping me, I won't involve you in this any farther," he handed her back the books she had lent him then got up to leave.

"Be careful Orochimaru, I'll look out for you, but there is a limit to what I can do as a professor if anything dangerous happens." She got up and started to gather her things as well, "I'll see you in the lab."

As Orochimaru left the library he started to question his sanity. He had just refused to listen to possibly the most beautiful person he had ever met and made her worry about him, and then he had scared her. I am such an idiot, he thought. Then slammed his book against his forehead for being stupid.

He walked into the dorm building and up the stairs to his floor. When he got there he heard commotion down the hall. Intrigued, he walked towards the loud shouting. Oddly enough it was coming from near his room. As he got closer he could see a crowd of the guys from the floor all yelling and hollering in a circle around Hidan and Kabuto. They were fighting again.

Hidan had blood on his shirt and had blood trickling out of the corner of his mouth. His hands were balled into fists and his knuckles were purple and swollen. He was scowling and snarling, and his eyes were wild and terrifying.

Kabuto looked significantly worse, he had a black eye and the entire side of his face was swollen, he has also gripping his shoulder tightly and there was blood was running down his arm which hung limply. "It's none of your business what I do!" He yelled at Hidan.

"You try and break into my friend's room and it becomes my business!" Hidan said back, "Now get the hell out of here." With that he rushed at Kabuto and hit him in the side, there was an awful crunching noise as Kabuto's ribs bruised and cracked.

Kabuto turned and ran down the hallway past Orochimaru, shoving him into the wall as he passed.

The crowd started to disperse and Orochimaru walked towards his room, there was evidence of the fight all over the hallway: blood on the carpet and the walls, ripped decorations, and a hole in the wall about the size of Hidan's fist. As he neared his door he heard someone mutter something about their hallway winning the decorating contest if they left the mess.

Hidan leaned against the wall as he saw Orochimaru coming towards him. He let out a sigh, what was this guy's deal? What was happening in this room that Kabuto was so interested in it?

"Hidan! Are you ok?"

Blackness started to cloud his vision and his head started to feel very light all of a sudden. He could feel himself sliding down the wall towards the floor. He could faintly hear Orochimaru's voice yelling and a hand on his shoulder. Crap, he thought, not passing out that is way uncool. Then darkness.

Kabuto stepped out of the dorm building into the Halloween dusk, he cursed and spat blood out of his mouth. Slowly he started to walk to the back of the building near the dumpster and leaned up against the wall. He lifted his shirt to see the damage: bruises ran up and down his side and there were small cuts in places. He gritted his teeth and leaned back against the wall, it was nothing that he wasn't used to already.

Kabuto slid down the wall the so that he was sitting on the ground, he was starting to feel light headed from the pain but he couldn't risk passing out. It was growing dark and he knew that he had to get ready for the big Halloween party, if Itachi and Orochimaru were going to be there then he absolutely had to be there to. He felt a little bad, he hadn't wanted to go to college to terrorize other students, he had come to learn or at least he had intended to come to learn. All that had changed when he had gotten his room assignment, all of a sudden it had become the time for his father to discover the secrets of the Uchiha family.

He slammed his fist onto the pavement, accidently cutting the side of his hand on a piece of broken glass. He had tried to fight it, tried to say no, but there was no arguing with his parents. They were part of something he had been dragged into by birth and he hated every day of it. He had told them he wanted to pursue science, but they had laughed in his face. He'd had perfect grades throughout school but all they cared about was how he did in martial arts. All he was to them was a tool, some minion that they happened to be the parents of.

When he got up to leave, the stars were already coming out and the only light to see by was from the windows of the dorm building. Kabuto slowly walked back to the door, wincing with every step from the bruised ribs which sent intense waves of pain throughout his body. He eventually made it back to his room and started to get ready for the party. It was almost eight o'clock and Itachi would be out of lab hours soon.

As he was getting ready he saw the mirror that Orochimaru had broken. He paused for a moment and looked at himself in the fractured glass. Sometimes that was how he felt: fractured. Sure he was healthy and a great student, but something inside of him made no sense at all, something was broken. He looked away and started to pull on his costume, a black turtle neck and black pants with a mask. He figured that going as a ninja would be fairly subtle since it was dark and, with what he was about to do, he would need to blend into the night. He breathed in and set his jaw, then left for the party.

It was about nine o'clock when Itachi and Orochimaru left the lab, Hidan had just not shown up at all but they weren't really surprised.

"Itachi! Walk faster!" Orochimaru was walking quickly down the path draped in a white sheet, he seemed to be more excited about the party now that he knew no one could see his face.

"Slow down or you'll trip over your sheet." Itachi grumbled, he was wearing what he usually wore, black jeans and a black vest with a gray hood, except instead of his usual red shirt, he had on a white t-shirt. Of course he had the ears, tail, and bell from Anko and he felt no inclination to get to the party any faster than he had to.

The white sheet turned around and stood, waiting impatiently for Itachi to catch up. "You don't have to be so miserable Itachi, it's going to be fun!"

"For you. You don't have to be a cat." Itachi stopped and crossed his arms. "I think I'm just going to head back…I can't do this." He turned around and started walking away.

"NOOOOOOO!" Orochimaru yelled and ran over to stop him. Unfortunately the sheet slipped and the eyeholes moved so Orochimaru ended up running straight into Itachi's back and the two fell heavily onto the ground.

"Ow…"

"I'm sorry!" Orochimaru leapt up and pulled the sheet off then helped Itachi get up, "You can't leave, I can't go alone…"

"Hidan will be there…" Itachi looked to the side, he knew he should go for Orochimaru's sake.

"Please…" Orochimaru stared up at Itachi and opened his eyes really wide, he hoped that he looked convincing.

Itachi pictured Sasuke, then looked down at the ground. "fine." He answered quietly then turned and started walking back towards the party.

Orochimaru smiled and pulled the sheet back on and started followed Itachi into the building.

The party was being held in the Common building, it was covered from roof to basement in cobwebs and paper skeletons with bright lights flashing and loud music blaring. There was one room that had a DJ and dance floor and one that was devoted to food. All around were small activities including everything from bobbing for apples to scary movie marathons. All around were other students dressed in an array of costumes that looked like they either took no effort or were trying too hard to be sexy.

Itachi was overwhelmed as soon as he stepped into the building. Almost every student on campus was there and it felt like they were all staring at him. The lights were too bright, the music was too loud, and everything smelled like sugar and sweat. He felt panic rising in his throat and he wanted to run away as fast as he could.

"Wow…" Orochimaru stepped past Itachi, his eyes taking in everything from under the sheet, "there's so many people here." He looked over at Itachi and saw that he was getting ready to turn and sprint out the door. Orochimaru reached over and grabbed Itachi's arm and pulled him farther into the building, "Let's find Hidan and Anko!"

Itachi followed without saying anything, he had grown incredibly pale. He watched as the people went walking past and Orochimaru dragged him deeper into the colorful mass of festivities.

"Guys!" there was an excited voice from behind them and Anko stepped out of nowhere followed closely by Hidan. They both looked totally unlike themselves, Hidan was wearing cargo pants and military boots with a t-shirt and leather jacket. Anko was wearing a short tight dress covered in sequins with the tallest heels in existence. She was holding a microphone and had on intense amounts of makeup.

"So glad you guys actually showed up!" Hidan smiled and knocked fists with each of them. "We were starting to worry that you guys bailed!" He looked over at Itachi, "uh, Orochimaru is he ok?"

"I'm not sure... I think he's just not used to people or this kind of social situation..." Orochimaru looked over at Itachi again, "he seems to be coming back around though."

Anko reached over and punched Itachi in the arm. "Snap out of it Itachi!" then she stomped on his foot with her heel.

"Ow!" Itachi snapped out of his overwhelmed state and glared at Anko, "come on, that hurt!"

Hidan laughed, "dude, you were spacing out and scaring people. Just relax and enjoy yourself!"

Itachi was quiet for a moment, "I don't know, I kind of just want to leave."

The three others just stared at him, he was impossible, constantly avoiding people and being alone. Hidan sighed, "Itachi, we didn't want to have to do this, but we figured you might be this way." he reached around Itachi and pinned his arms to his sides. Anko started pushing the two of them towards the room blaring music.

Itachi tried to fight back, he tried to slow them down by dragging his feet and twisting, but together they were stronger than he was. "Guys, come on. You don't have to be so pushy."

"Relax bro!" Hidan yelled and they pushed him into the room with the dance.

It was a swirling mass of colors and noise. The room was dark, but there were bright neon lights flashing and swirling across the ceiling. Music blared from massive stacks of speakers in every corner. And the people. People were everywhere, twisting and moving, rubbing up against each other, sweating and jumping.

Itachi froze, he had absolutely no idea what to do. He turned to leave, but when he did there was a girl standing behind him, she was very short and dressed in what looked like underwear paired with bunny ears.

"Hey, you're a cat, that's so adorable!" She smiled wide and put her hand on his chest and started pushing him towards the middle of the mob of people.

This was new to Itachi, he didn't know how to respond and even though he had no idea who this girl was or what she wanted to do, he just felt himself get pushed along into the middle of a pulsating mass of college students.

Hidan, Anko, and Orochimaru all watched from the door as Itachi was forced into dancing with a girl. They stood and laughed hysterically as he stood there and the girl draped herself on him and started to dance.

"I feel kind of bad... he looks so clueless." Anko said finally, between fits of laughter.

"It's good for him!" Hidan replied, "He is considered one of the most attractive guys on campus and he has absolutely no game whatsoever!" Then reached for Anko's hand, "Wanna dance? Maybe we can help him from the dance floor!" and the two went off to go join Itachi and his…new friend.

Orochimaru stood and watched from the side, it was probably one of the most entertaining things he had ever seen and he couldn't help but laugh. Poor Itachi was thrown into a dance and didn't know what to do. Orochimaru sighed, it was slightly relieving to know that no one knew who he was and that they weren't staring at his eyes or pale skin. He felt normal, for the first time in his life. He had friends and even though he didn't want to join them on the dance floor he still felt that they were all together and hanging out. As much as he hated to admit it, being accepted by three people had made him the happiest he had felt in a long time.

After what felt like an hour of terrifying awkwardness, Itachi felt a hand grab his arm and pull him out away from the strange girl and dancing crowd and towards the exit. He was dripping with sweat and on the verge of throwing up when he saw Hidan, Anko, and Orochimaru standing around him.

"So, was she nice?" Anko asked, smiling pleasantly.

Itachi scowled.

"She must have been really nice or really desperate to dance with your limp corpse!" Hidan laughed, then playfully punched Itachi on the shoulder.

He knew that they were just having fun and it hadn't really been terrible or anything, but Itachi had his limits and now he really wanted to leave. "I think I'm gonna be sick.." he started walking towards the bathroom slowly, then realized that he did in fact feel nauseated and started to sprint for the bathroom.

Orochimaru was concerned, he had never seen his friend in such a state before and started to follow Itachi. He made it to the door just in time to hear coughing and vomiting coming from inside the bathroom. This made him pause. He didn't really know what he could do and itachi seemed like the type that didn't want to be seen or have a fuss made over him while he was leaning over a toilet.

Hidan and Anko caught up to Orochimaru, "Oro, is he ok in there?" Anko asked, concerned.

"I think so, just let him get it out I guess."

They all stood around the bathroom entrance, waiting for Itachi to come out. After a while, the door slowly opened and itachi walked out looking pale and sweaty, the lines on his face standing out more than usual. "I think I should leave now..." he barely managed to whisper.

"I'll walk you back," said Orochimaru, but Itachi just held up his hand.

"You're enjoying yourself, stay. Bring me back some candy corn for later... I think I just need to get some rest…" and he walked towards the building entrance.

As soon as he left the building he started to feel better, the night air cleared out his lungs and his stomach started to settle down, he breathed in deeply and walked away into the night. The stars were out and were shining brightly and there was a full moon. The light reflected off the campus pond and shone down among the trees and buildings. It was beautiful and serene and the further Itachi got from the Halloween party, the more relaxed he felt.

Something started pulling at the back of Itachi's mind, the strange feeling that he was being watched. He had grown up learning to trust that instinct so he turned around to see if anyone had followed him out. He didn't see anything. Or maybe he did… he squinted at the land around him and noticed a figure dressed all in black darting from shadow to shadow in his direction.

"Who's there!" itachi said loudly, he tensed his body not sure what to think about being followed. It certainly wasn't something that he expected to happen.

Nothing moved. Itachi started walking in the direction of the figure, he walked slowly because he was still feeling weak from throwing up earlier.

He never saw the first blow coming. It felt like he had walked into a brick wall that just happened to all hit him right in the center of the chest. He went flying backwards and landed on his back slightly dazed.

The figure walked out of the darkness and put a foot on his chest then leaned over. He could faintly see a crooked smile. The person was wearing a black mask and Itachi couldn't make out any other features.

"This is the famed first born of the Uchiha family?" the figure snorted. "I've taken on children who put up more of a fight than you."

Itachi scowled, he didn't like the fact that this person acted like they knew something about his family and especially that this guy thought he was weak. He shoved the guys foot off of his chest and stood up, "if you want to fight go right ahead, but I'm not responsible if you get hurt." And he crouched down, steadying himself and preparing to strike.

The figure took a step back and assumed a fighting stance, "I wouldn't be so confident, I was created to incapacitate and kill."

Itachi struck first, landing a kick on the guy's side, then a hit on the side of his head. This left an opening for his opponent to strike and he blocked a punch aimed at the side of his face. This was followed by a sweep kick which landed Itachi back on the ground. He rolled out of the way just in time to dodge a kick aimed at his side. He rolled into a standing position and used the momentum to throw himself at his attacker and pull him to the ground.

They rolled down the hill, throwing punches and kicking each other, itachi was pretty sure he even felt himself get bitten once. At the bottom of the hill they separated and Itachi stood up a split second before the other guy managed to and he took the opportunity to hit him in the back.

The other guy stayed down and coughed into the dirt. Itachi stood, looking down at his opponent, "Why did you follow me." He asked in a stern voice, though he could feel himself getting ready to vomit again.

There was faint laughter as the other guy picked himself up slowly, "because you… you are my target." He stood across from Itachi and smiled. There was a trickle of blood at the corner of his mouth. Then before Itachi knew what was happening, he reached over and grabbed his neck, slamming him into the ground.

His head started to pound immediately and he was surprised that he wasn't knocked unconscious. Itachi let out a cough and struggled to breathe as he felt the guy's hand squeezing his throat.

"You don't know me, but your friend Orochimaru does. In fact, Orochimaru and I have a bit of a deal going on, he does research on your family and I steal it and send it to my boss. You thought you had a friend, but really he's only been interested in your eyes and the power they hold." He laughed, "You really are naïve to think that going to a school away from your house was letting you escape your family life."

Itachi coughed again, then managed to grab the other guy's shirt and he pulled as hard as he could, dragging his attackers face close to his, "you…are a … liar." He wheezed, then summoned the rest of his strength and punched the other guy in the temple, knocking him unconscious.

Itachi gulped in air and lay on his back for a minute. Then he slowly picked himself up and limped back to the dormitory. He didn't know who that was, but he had a guess who he was related to: the dragon triad. They had been enemies with his family for as long as he could remember. The last thing he had expected was to meet one here, miles away from home.

He got back to the dorms and took a shower and cleaned himself up as much as possible, though some things he wouldn't be able to hide. He looked in the mirror, he had a massive bruise on the side of his face and his entire body was covered in cuts and scratches. He even found the bite mark on his wrist. He sighed and sat down on the edge of his bed. He knew he should call home and tell his father what happened. But that would lead to questions. He knew exactly what Orochimaru was researching and while it bothered him, he didn't feel like it was a threat in any way. But, his father wouldn't see things like that.

He felt a familiar sting behind his eyes. He groaned, perfect timing, he thought, just when he felt he couldn't be in any more pain. He managed to crawl into bed before the burning started and he curled up and squeezed his eyes shut as hard as he could, wincing from his earlier injuries. It was worse this time, the burning started and intensified and spread through his entire head. He screamed, tears oozed out of his eyes. Just as he thought his head would explode, it stopped. There was a faint tingling sensation and the burning subsided.

This is new, he thought, then managed to get up and crawl over to the mirror. He stared, his eyes stared back: bright red iris with odd black symbols. This was normal, what was odd was that there were more symbols than before, instead of the usual two there were three now and it didn't seem to hurt. He continued to stare as his eyes faded back to the usual black, something had changed and he wasn't sure how it would affect him in the future.

He crawled back into bed exhausted and fell right to sleep. He didn't even wake up when Orochimaru got back and turned the light on to get ready for bed.

Orochimaru snuck in and started changing quickly, he looked over at Itachi who was asleep, then gasped when he saw that he was all cut up and bruised. What had happened after he left the party? He would have to ask in the morning. Orochimaru yawned then turned out the light and crawled between his covers. He stared across the room at Itachi who was illuminated by moonlight filtering in through the window. Orochimaru sighed quietly, then rolled over, he couldn't help but think that it was partly his fault that something happened to Itachi. He let him walk home alone in the dark after all, and to make it worse, when he was sick. He closed his eyes and tried to sleep but his mind kept on drifting back to Itachi's beat up face.

It's Hard to Hide Bruises

Orochimaru woke up the next morning to the sound of a leaf blower on the quad. He yawned and stretched then sat up. Today was Saturday, and that meant no classes and all the private research time in the world. He was about to get out of bed when he noticed that Itachi was still asleep. That's odd, he thought, then checked time thinking that it might be a lot earlier than he thought it was. It was almost 11.

Concerned, Orochimaru quietly walked over and peered at Itachi. He was almost completely covered in blankets and curled up in fetal position. From where he was standing, Orochimaru could just make out a dark purple and yellow bruise forming on the side of Itachi's face near his jaw that extended almost up to his cheekbone.

Oh yeah, it all came flooding back. Orochimaru stepped back and stared at Itachi's sleeping form, he felt numb and he felt all the blame and guilt fall back onto his shoulders. He backed up until he was sitting on his bed again. It was no use trying to avoid it, he knew exactly who had done this and it was his fault for not telling Itachi everything, his fault for letting him leave alone in the dark. He unconsciously put his hand on his neck, remembering his first encounter with Kabuto.

Itachi let out a small groan and rolled over in his sleep so that he was facing toward Orochimaru, but he didn't wake up. Now Orochimaru stared at his full face, there were a few cuts: one at the edge of his mouth, one on the side of his forehead, and a cluster of smaller cuts on the cheek opposite the bruise. Orochimaru winced, it's all my fault it's all my fault it's all my fault repeated over and over again in his head.

Orochimaru quickly threw on black pants and a t-shirt and got ready to get breakfast as fast as possible. He needed to get away and think about this, figure out how to rationalize this in his head. He almost sprinted to the dining hall and got food, then found a corner to sit in alone. He sat for a while, he felt so guilty that he couldn't eat anything.

As he sat staring into space, Orochimaru saw a tall figure limp past. It was Kabuto, and he looked half dead. He had a black eye, a split lip, and what looked like a broken nose. He had bandages on his right hand and he seemed to be favoring his left leg when he walked. He was keeping his head down and sat in the darkest corner of the cafeteria. This confirmed it for Orochimaru, Kabuto had definitely gone after Itachi, though he was still unsure who had won the fight, both of them looked terrible.

There was a faint electronic beep and Orochimaru blinked, suddenly aware of his surroundings again. He checked his phone, it was a text from Itachi: Oro, slept in today can you grab me something from the caf? Tea please, black one sugar packet and some milk. Orochimaru sighed and put his phone away, he wasn't going to let Itachi try to pretend that nothing happened, it was time to tell him everything.

After he grabbed Itachi's tea and a pumpkin chocolate chip muffin, one of Itachi's favorites, he walked back to the dormitory. With every step he could feel the guilt growing heavier and heavier on his shoulders. He felt like crying, something he hadn't felt since the beginning of the semester, after this he might lose the only close friend he'd ever had.

Orochimaru dragged his feet getting back to the dormitory building, half hoping that he would bump into Hidan on the way and that Hidan would have some terrible idea or crazy plan that he would be needed for instead of facing Itachi. As he neared the door to their room he felt his stomach twist up into knots and he started to get chills. He slowly twisted the handle and walked into the room, all the lights were off and the only light came in through the window.

Itachi was sitting at his desk with a textbook. He had on a t-shirt and athletic shorts, the short sleeves revealing more cuts and bruises. When he heard the door open he looked up, "hey, did you get my text?"

"y-yeah" Orochimaru put the tea and muffin on Itachi's desk then stood there.

"thanks." He went back to reading, then noticed that Orochimaru hadn't moved. "Uh, how was the rest of the party?"

Orochimaru was quiet and started to bite his lip, he didn't know how to start to explain. Half of him wanted to just go with ignoring what happened but deep down he knew it was wrong.

"Orochimaru… are you alright? You seem anxious." Itachi had turned and was now facing him, slowly sipping tea.

"I… i-i-it's my fault!" was all Orochimaru managed to get out, then walked towards his desk and sat down on the floor.

Itachi didn't say anything, he hadn't wanted Orochimaru to feel this way. He knew that it might happen but not exactly like this. He clenched his jaw and looked away from his friend. "I don't know what you're talking about, I'm fine."

Orochimaru looked up, now he was mad. "You're not fine! Look at yourself! It would have never happened if I had just minded my own business!"

Itachi's head swiveled back to Orochimaru, his face was expressionless. "Oro, really it's nothing." He didn't know what else to say, he didn't really want to talk about it.

Orochimaru slammed his head into the leg of his desk, knocking over a stack of books. "Augh, you don't get it! I'm the reason why you were attacked! I'm the one who shouldn't have started anything in the first place!"

"I knew what you were researching, Oro." Itachi said quietly.

"No, you don't." Orochimaru stood up and pulled a notebook out that Itachi had never seen before. He tossed it at Itachi who caught it easily.

Itachi started to flip through the pages, inside were sketches of his eyes, pictures of his family, and notes scribbled all over the place about genetic ocular mutations, about how they could be organized by geographical location. He got to one page labeled side effects and saw everything that he experienced, stinging, itching, and panic attacks. The page opposite was blank except for a title: How to Help.

Itachi stopped at this page and stared at it, he could feel a lump forming in his throat, he felt tears coming but he quickly blinked them away.

"I shouldn't have looked into your family, I shouldn't have started researching this, I should have listened to Dr. Ramona." He looked at Itachi, "I should have told you about Kabuto."

Itachi closed the notebook and handed it back to Orochimaru. "Who's Kabuto?"

"He was supposed to be your roommate, and I don't know why but for some reason he was really interested in learning stuff about you. He stole a picture and some of my notes, and Hidan caught him trying to break into our room once. He knows about Karin. I don't know how but he knows almost everything and I know that he was the one who attacked you last night!" Orochimaru felt everything gush out of him all at once, it was relieving but he still didn't know how Itachi would react.

Itachi looked out the window, he understood now. He sighed, it might be a good time to tell Orochimaru a little bit about his life. "Kabuto is a member of the Dragon Triad. They are a gang from my home town, and they are in the middle of a turf war with my family." He paused, "my father… he is the head of the family." He looked Orochimaru straight in the eyes, "what you hear next you can't tell anyone, not Hidan or Anko or Dr. Ramona." He paused and watched this new information sink in. "In my family there is a genetic mutation where our eyes react to changes in blood pressure and levels of adrenaline. When used by people who can control it, like my father, it can be used for heightened observation or even to predict what someone will do next."

Orochimaru stood in the half light of the room, everything was making sense. He didn't know why but he felt himself walking forward slowly, he stood next to Itachi's chair and gently reached over and touched Itachi's eyes. "y-you're…j-just l-like m-m-me…" he could feel tears coming and he didn't try to stop them, he understood now why he and Itachi had become friends, "you have weird eyes… just like me."

Itachi reached up and gently moved Orochimaru's hand, "It's a family secret that a lot of people want to get their hands on… please, if you are going to study this, you need to not tell anyone. If you can't do that you have to stop, or someone will find out and you'll get hurt." Itachi stood up and looked down into Orochimaru's wide snake eyes, "you don't have weird eyes, Oro. They're yours and you should be proud of them."

Orochimaru stepped back then wiped the tears off his face quickly, "sorry, I-I d-d-didn't m-m-mean t-to…"

"It's fine." Itachi half smiled at Orochimaru, he felt that now things wouldn't be as weird. He was starting to feel that he could trust Orochimaru and even though he knew that his friend didn't know what to do if he had an episode, he wouldn't have to run and hide and that was a big relief.

The rest of the afternoon they studied quietly in their room, the atmosphere seemed more relaxed now. Itachi had explained that the fight had ended with Kabuto unconscious and that he knew how to handle himself. Orochimaru seemed to have relaxed and calmed down, he gave his research notebook to Itachi and said that he would find a new project.

Kabuto stood in the darkest place that he could find, he was in a cluster of trees at the southern corner of the campus. He often came down to "the woods" as the other students called it, he needed time away from people and time away from what his parents considered his job: finding out Uchiha secrets. He liked this corner because it was isolated and the trees seemed to dampen any noise in the area.

Today he was angry, angry at himself, angry at his parents, and angry at the school. He stood in front of a tree and punched it repeatedly, pounding his anger into the rough bark. With every punch more skin tore off his knuckles and soon his hands were purple, swollen, and bleeding.

"Why can't I just be normal!" he yelled into the silence, then fell forward and leaned his forehead against the tree. He didn't cry, he never had, he was raised better than that. His parents would never find out that he had been beaten by the Uchiha, he would make sure of that, if they found out he would be punished for it just like any other member of the triad would be.

He flung himself into a patch of grass and stared up at the sky, he could feel the blood dripping down his hands into the dirt, "why do I have to do this?!" he shouted into the cloudy void, "I don't care!"

There was a distant thunderclap and rain started to pour down from the sky, Kabuto stayed in the grass, the feeling of rain made him forget that he was bleeding. While he was growing up, he'd had no problem working for the triad, he would do anything to get his parent's approval. But now he just didn't care. He was tired of striving to gain favor that he was never going to get. Of course now it was too late, he was in too deep with the triad to ever think about having a normal life. He had thought about it, even if he studied science like he wanted to he had no idea what a normal life was, so he had resigned himself to the fate of becoming muscle for his parents.

It started to downpour and he figured that he should probably get back to the main part of campus. He would be getting a phone call from his father soon enough to see how last night went. Of course there was nothing to report: he had ended up unconscious and saw no evidence of any mysterious eye powers.

He walked up the path, rain soaking into his black t-shirt and flattening down his hair. He saw other students hurrying around under umbrellas or in raincoats, but he just kept walking. When he got to the dormitory he stood outside a while, some kid offered him a cigarette and he gratefully accepted it, he didn't smoke much but he needed one today.

As he was standing there he saw Itachi and Orochimaru leave and head towards the dining hall, all his anger came back and he slammed his fist into the brick wall behind him. What was he going to do next, he didn't want to keep on harassing these guys. Of course, he did want to fight Itachi again. No one, absolutely no one beat him.

He turned and went inside the dorms and back up to his room. His roommate was playing video games, like always, so he went to take a shower. He rinsed off the rainwater and the blood from the night before and from recently. All of his cuts stung. He winced, but he let the feeling linger. He pulled on dry clothes and went back to his room. He did the one thing that he always did when he was upset: read textbooks. There was something about the solid facts that gave him a sense of comfort when he was confused, even though he hated his situation and couldn't figure out how to fix it, he could solve math and science problems. At least they had an answer.

Itachi could feel the entire campus staring at him. It made sense why, you don't usually see a guy who is beat up and injured walking around like nothing happened. A few people asked him if he needed anything and a campus security guard gave him a wary look and followed him and Orochimaru for a few minutes.

They got dinner and sat near the fringe of the dining hall, Itachi pulled the hood of his sweatshirt up so he could cover his face and eat in peace without prying eyes. His phone buzzed and he checked the message. He let out a sigh, "Hidan and Anko are joining us."

"Ok," Orochimaru didn't really care, then he remembered that Itachi had been in a fight. Hidan would definitely react to this, possibly react rashly and without thinking.

"Hidan is gonna get mad." Itachi said, voicing Orochimaru's thoughts.

"Should we tell him?"

Itachi thought for a second, "doesn't really matter, as long as he doesn't go after Kabuto and make himself an enemy of the triad."

Hidan and Anko walked up to the table, they were holding hands. Orochimaru and Itachi looked at each other, they had suspected something was up with the two of them. "Hey guys!" Hidan smiled and pulled up two chairs.

Itachi managed to angle himself so that the majority of his face was towards Orochimaru, "so, are you guy's official now?" Itachi thought of the first thing that came to his mind to talk about so they wouldn't start asking any questions.

Hidan and Anko looked at each other, then Anko turned bright red and she giggled, "Today…"

"Yeah, just a few minutes a go actually, we wanted to tell you guys first." Hidan was smiling and he looked at Anko.

Orochimaru felt uncomfortable, he never was in this situation before, should he say congratulations, should he say anything? "That's cool." He managed to get out.

"it's not gonna be that different, we all hung out together before anyways, so don't think that the dynamic is going to change much, we'll just be sitting closer to each other than before." Anko said.

Itachi continued to eat throughout this conversation, carefully keeping the shadow of the hood over his face, he had almost finished when he felt someone lightly punch his shoulder and he winced.

Hidan scowled, "Itachi, you've been quiet."

"He's always quiet." Orochimaru said quickly, then realized he probably shouldn't have said something so fast.

"Is something going on with you two?" Anko asked, she looked at Orochimaru then over at Itachi's hooded face.

Hidan reached over quickly and tried to pull the hood off, but Itachi blocked him with one arm, wincing again from one of the bruises. Hidan narrowed his eyes. "What is going on that you two don't want us to know about?"

Itachi finished his food and stood up to leave, "nothing is going on, just didn't get sleep because I was sick and I look terrible. Happy for you two, though. I'll be more enthusiastic when I feel better." Then he started to walk away.

Orochimaru quickly finished and grabbed his things so he could follow Itachi out of the dining hall, but Hidan stood up and blocked his way. "Orochimaru, there is something going on with you two. Tell me what it is."

Orochimaru ducked around Hidan, "sorry, we have a project to do and we have to get back to work on it, see you around!" then he sprinted after Itachi.

Anko looked at Hidan, "what is going on with those two? Did you see how Itachi winced? He's hurt Hidan."

"I know, but he's trying to hide it, and that's what's worrying me." Hidan sighed then picked up his bag. "Guess he'll tell us when he's ready. I just hope that's sooner rather than later."

They left the dining hall together then shared an umbrella while walking back to the dormitory. They decided to hang out in Hidan's room and watch movies, but the whole time they were worried about Itachi and Orochimaru.

Itachi had started to sketch since he couldn't handle studying anymore. Orochimaru was reading Wikipedia articles about weird species of reptiles and saying random facts out loud for Itachi to hear. They often did this when they didn't have class work, sometimes they would play music. It was how they relaxed.

Itachi was mid sketch when his phone went off again, the sound almost made Itachi throw his sketch book across the room and Orochimaru almost fell backwards off his chair. A long guttural yell echoed from the tiny speakers followed by a long heavy metal guitar solo.

Itachi slowly picked up the phone, "hello?"

"Itaaaaaaaaaaaaaachiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!" there was a small squeaky voice from the other end.

Itachi smiled right away, a full smile which Orochimaru had never seen before. "Sasuke!" he got more comfortable on his chair, "How's middle school going?"

"Eh, I don't really like it, there is this one kid named Naruto who doesn't know anything but still thinks he's smarting than me. And we end up doing all our projects together, it's kind of annoying." There was a pause, "I really like the martial arts classes though! I'm really good! My sensei says that I could be amazing like you some day!"

Itachi's face got serious and he squeezed the phone, "really? When did you start taking them?"

"In September! Dad said that I could start since I was old enough finally! I can't wait to show you how much I learned tomorrow!"

"Tomorrow?"

"Yeah! We're visiting you at school! I can't wait to see your room."

Itachi inhaled quickly and did a scan of the room, there was nothing his parents would disapprove of on the walls and his things were neat and organized, he relaxed. "Is it just you and mom?" He silently hoped Sasuke would say yes.

"Dad is coming too! He said he needed to talk to you about something. I hope it doesn't take long, I wanna hang out with you! I miss you a lot. The house is more serious when you aren't here, I have to do all my schoolwork before I can play and when dad gets home I have to practice with him."

"I miss you too Sasuke, I have a friend you should meet when you get here. He's excited to meet you." Itachi looked over at Orochimaru who had been watching.

"You have friends?"

"Yes, Sasuke, I have friends. And more than just one."

There was a deep voice in the background, "Itachi, dad wants to say hi!"

"No, wait…" Itachi started to panic, he didn't want to risk triggering another episode, but he mostly didn't want to talk to his father.

"Itachi."

"Father." He groaned inwardly.

"I expect that you have all your studies in order allowing us to spend some time with you." The voice was cold and stern, nothing new there.

"Yeah, I have time." Itachi responded, he started dreading the next day. He wasn't ready to see his father in person, especially right after the fight.

"Good. We will be there at noon. Meet us in front of the student center where we dropped you off."

"Yes sir." He could feel his temper rising, "give Sasuke back the phone."

There was shuffling on the other end and Itachi heard faint voices. He heard his mom and his father talking, then Sasuke's voice came back, "did you find all the pictures I sent you?"

Itachi laughed, "I think I'm still finding them, how many did you hide?" as he said this a picture floated down from the top of his wardrobe.

"Oh, a few…"

"Sasuke, there is definitely more than just a few. There are so many I had to get a box just to put them all in!"

There was silence on the other side and some shuffling around. The voices in the background grew fainter and Itachi heard a door slam, "Itachi… why are you and dad always fighting?"

He sighed, this wasn't the first time that Sasuke had asked him something like this and he had tried really hard not to drag him into the friction between him and his father, but his father had other ideas. "Don't worry about it Sasuke, it's just something that he and I have to talk through."

"But Itachi, I never see you two talk. It's usually him just talking and you don't say anything and then…" he stopped.

"Sasuke, please." He hated the fact that Sasuke had to see the kind of relationship he had with their father, he wanted Sasuke to grow up and live normally, but that path was already starting disappear.

"I think I have to go, mom and dad are calling me back inside, I'll see you tomorrow Itachi!"

"See you tomorrow!" then Itachi hung up the phone. He flipped his textbook back open and started to read again, he wouldn't have time to do anything tomorrow like he had originally planned.

"I-Itachi? Are you gonna be ok?" Orochimaru asked from across the room, he was worried, he never saw Itachi act like he did when he talked to his father.

"I guess I have plans tomorrow, do you mind hanging around? I'm gonna need someone to watch Sasuke for a bit. I... have to talk to my…father." He said the word with disgust. "I'm not sure how long that's gonna take and I don't want Sasuke there." He looked over at Orochimaru.

"Yeah, I think so, I can introduce him to Karin or find Hidan and Anko. I can watch him." He gave Itachi a smile, hoping that it would make Itachi feel better.

There was a knock on the door, then the door opened and Hidan stepped in. Itachi quickly pulled his hood back up and turned out his desk lamp making his corner of the room very dark. Orochimaru slammed his laptop closed, he felt guilty for no reason at all, but he felt that he should direct the attention away from Itachi somehow.

"What is going on with you guys!?" Hidan was exasperated, he didn't like it knowing that there was something that they weren't telling him and they weren't hiding it very well.

"Just…chilling in our room, you know, studying and stuff." Orochimaru said slowly.

"In the dark?"

"Itachi likes to read in the dark, it…is more relaxing and…keeps him from… staying awake all night." Orochimaru was starting to run out of ideas.

"I know you're lying." Hidan squinted at Orochimaru. Then he walked over and put a hand on Itachi's shoulder, he noticed Itachi wince slightly then relax. "You wanna go to the game room? There is street fighter tournament going on."

"No, I think I'd rather study, I have family visiting tomorrow and I need to have the chapter read before then… and I have an essay to write." The essay didn't actually exist, Itachi was trying to make himself sound busier so Hidan would leave.

There was a click and Itachi's desk lamp turned back on. Hidan stood next to it, Itachi couldn't remember him even reaching for the switch. Hidan let out a small gasp and took a step back, "Itachi! Who the hell did this." His face twisted into a snarling frown.

Itachi pulled the hood back and looked at Hidan, "It's not as bad as you think, besides I've had worse. Look, there isn't anything you can do to help, I'd rather you not get involved. It's a bit of a…personal matter." He started to turn back to his textbook, "it's also mostly taken care of. You should see the other guy." He said, then started scribbling notes.

"You know I can't just stand by and ignore this." Hidan was talking through clenched teeth, "who was it."

Itachi ignored him, hoping it would make him give up and leave. Of course it didn't work, that wasn't the kind of person that Hidan was.

He turned to Orochimaru, "it was Kabuto wasn't it?" he punched the door as he said this, making Itachi and Orochimaru flinch.

Itachi was quiet, he didn't want to drag Hidan into this and if he had to get rough then he would. He stood up and faced Hidan, "I fight my own battles, Hidan. I don't need you protecting me." He stared at his friend directly in the eyes.

Hidan met his gaze, "I don't care what you think. This isn't the first time this guy has targeted one of you two and I'm not going to sit back and watch you get beat up repeatedly." There was a long pause as they stood, staring at each other.

"Mind your own business, Hidan." Itachi was making a face that Orochimaru had never seen before, he was snarling and his entire body was tense and he looked ready to start a fight with Hidan right there in the room.

"Why do you isolate yourself so much!? I'm offering you help, it's not a sign of weakness to accept it." he stepped closer to Itachi, his hands were balled into fists.

"I fight my own battles. You're just going to have to accept it." Itachi replied then moved to sit back down.

Hidan reached out and grabbed the front of his shirt, "What is your deal? You're not alone Itachi! You have friends who are here for you, who would fight for you, and care about your well-being! Stop closing yourself off! Yeah, we all have our own secrets, and you can have a private life, but you don't threaten people close to you! You aren't alone!" He was yelling and he pushed Itachi backwards as he let go of his shirt. Then he just stood there facing Itachi, "when are you going to realize it?" Hidan asked, then left the room.

Orochimaru stood speechless, he couldn't think of anything to say. Itachi stood motionless, hundreds of thoughts popped into his brain and started buzzing around. He slowly sat back down and started to do work again, it was best that Orochimaru didn't think that he was upset even though it might be too late for that.

As he worked he started thinking about Sasuke. The poor kid didn't know what was coming for him in the future, he started to feel guilty again for leaving. He had always been Sasuke's shield, protecting him from their father and his ambition, protecting him from getting turned into a monster.

Itachi and Orochimaru worked until about 11:30 then they started to get ready to go to sleep. Itachi flung himself down onto his bed, everything hurt. His head, his arms, his legs, and worst of all his heart. He was afraid that Hidan was right, He had always felt alone, growing up he didn't have any friends, he was trained at home and focused on his studies. Now there were people who didn't just see him as the next head of the family, they saw him as a person. He groaned, this was going to be the longest weekend of his life.

Orochimaru turned out the light and crawled into bed. He was scared, this was a whole new side of Itachi that he'd never seen before, and it was violent and angry. His friend was changing. He was glad that Itachi had told him about his eyes, it still comforted him that he wasn't the only one. He smiled to himself, he was looking forward to meeting Sasuke tomorrow, and the rest of Itachi's family. He sighed, "Goodnight Itachi." He said quietly, but there was no response.

A Visit from a Monster

The next day was unseasonably cold and Orochimaru woke up shivering. He groaned softly, he hated being cold it made him incredibly sleepy. He looked over and saw that the window was wide open, that's weird, he thought. He shivered again then got up to go close it.

"Please don't."

Orochimaru heard Itachi say from his bed. It was still pretty early in the morning so it was no surprise that Itachi was still there.

"I like the cold, it makes me use more blankets and I really don't want to get up." Itachi sounded tired, even though he had gotten into bed at 11:30, he hadn't really slept much.

"Are you worried about today?" Orochimaru asked, he went to the closet and took out his emergency electric blanket. "Aren't you excited that you get to see Sasuke?" Orochimaru plugged in the blanket then crawled underneath and pulled all of his blankets up to his ears.

"I'm looking forward to see Sasuke and my mom, it's everything else that is going to be terrible." He paused, "you remember what I asked you yesterday, right?"

"Yeah, watch Sasuke and hang out with him for a bit."

"Thanks," Itachi was quiet for a time, "I probably should talk to Hidan this morning." He felt terrible about the day before still and he was going to need Hidan and Anko to hang out with Orochimaru to watch Sasuke.

"Probably."

"I don't want to."

"If you keep avoiding him he's just going to push harder next time, you know how he is." Orochimaru snuggled deeper into his warm blankets. "Maybe you should ask him to eat with us or something."

There was a sigh from the other side of the room as Itachi pushed his blankets back and got up. He walked over and closed the window, shutting out the cold November morning. "I'll be back then." He grabbed a sweatshirt and pulled on a pair of socks. He left the room quietly and walked down the hall, most of the other students were still sleeping it was a Sunday after all.

Itachi stopped in front of Hidan's door, then took a deep breath and knocked softly. There was a loud thump and some scrambling from inside the room. Itachi heard whispering, he knew Hidan had a roommate, but he went home on the weekends.

Hidan cracked the door open and peered out. Itachi could tell that he was only wearing athletic shorts. It was odd, he'd never seen Hidan without a shirt on and he could tell that Hidan was very strong but noticed that there were scars all over his torso.

"Itachi, it's a little early don't you think?" Hidan blinked sleepily and started to smooth down his hair.

"It's only 8:30…" Itachi looked back down the hall at his room, "I wanted to…apologize… for yesterday."

"Oh," Hidan opened the door a little farther and stopped leaning against the door jamb. "It's really not that big a deal, as long as you know we're here for you."

Itachi hesitated, "I…I need you to help me with something today."

"Sure, what do you need?" this seemed to wake Hidan up a little.

"My family is visiting today and I need you to help Orochimaru watch my little brother for a bit, I have to talk to my parent's in private." He tried to be as vague as possible.

"Of course I can help! That sounds like fun." Hidan said, then glanced back into his room, "when do you think you'll need me?"

"Sometime in the afternoon maybe?" Itachi narrowed his eyes, there was definitely someone in the room with Hidan. "I thought your roommate went home on weekends?"

"Huh?" Hidan looked back at Itachi, "Oh!" he laughed, "he does, uh, I had someone… spend the night."

The door opened a little father and Anko peeked out, "Good morning Itachi!" she was smiling and waved.

Itachi waved back, he wasn't exactly surprised, "do you guys wanna join us for breakfast? Probably going to head down in an hour or so?"

"Sounds great!" Anko said.

"See you then." Hidan added then closed the door.

Itachi walked back down the hall to his room, he felt a little better knowing that he could depend on his friends to watch Sasuke. He was still dreading what was coming, but he felt a little better knowing that Sasuke wouldn't be around to see it.

When he got back to the room, Orochimaru was already dressed and making his bed, it looked a lot neater than usual as did his desk. Itachi raised an eyebrow at this but didn't say anything. He started to clean his side of the room, making his bed and making sure that all his books were in the right order. While they cleaned they unearthed around 15 more pictures from various places in the room and added them to the box.

Orochimaru fed Karin and then took her out of her aquarium and let her slither around his desk for a while. He sat on his chair and watched her nose her way around pencils and books. "Don't you ever wish that people could shed their skin and just start over?" Orochimaru said out of nowhere.

"Not really, never really thought about it before." Itachi replied as he straightened out some his shoes in the closet.

"I think it would be nice. Every few months you could get a new start. You would still be you and everything, with all the memories and knowledge, but you could have a new body and it would be stronger and better." He reached over and let Karin slither back onto his hand and he brought her close to his face. "Kind of like being immortal I guess."

"Snakes aren't immortal, Oro." Itachi said, he had moved on to his desk and started to brush off dust from the top shelves.

"But they live a long time." He let Karin lick the tip of his nose, then walked over and put her back into her home.

"Orochimaru, why are you so obsessed with snakes?" Itachi asked, it was something he had wondered for a long time.

Orochimaru unconsciously touched the snake tattoo on his arm, "when I was small, not long after…" he paused, "after I moved in with my uncle, I found a small white snake near…a special place. And I showed it to my uncle and he said that it would bring me good luck. I guess since then they have always been special, of course there is always being born with the eyes of a snake."

"Do you know why it happened?" Itachi finished cleaning and sat down at his desk.

"Not really, my uncle told me my mom was bitten by a snake when she was pregnant with me and some people say it was just a mutation. I just know I've always been this way."

Itachi nodded, another person with mysterious eyes. Fate was weird that way, he would have never imagined he would end up meeting someone else who was similar to him. Who could have predicted that he would end up being roommates with the guy?

Itachi and Orochimaru were almost done eating when Hidan and Anko joined them in the dining hall. They were both smiling and holding hands once again. Itachi noticed that Anko was wearing one of Hidan's t-shirts.

"Good morning guys!" Anko said and sat down with her food.

"Hey." Orochimaru said.

Itachi didn't say anything, just looked back out the window at the cold day outside.

Hidan sat down and started eating. He didn't say anything either, but he wasn't upset. He felt a little weird knowing that Itachi knew about him and Anko. He couldn't explain it, he didn't feel judged for it or anything, he just felt that Itachi saw him differently now. Of course it was probably because of the night before.

Pretty soon they were all eating and talking like normal, but Itachi didn't feel inclined to join into the conversation. The time passed slowly as the group finished eating, they didn't want to leave right away so they all just sat around the table.

Out of nowhere a dark figure walked up to them and they all fell quiet. Hidan tensed, Orochimaru looked down into his food and clenched his teeth. Itachi just kept looking away. The only one who acknowledged the new person was Anko, "hi, do you need something?" she asked.

"I need to talk to these three." The voice was hoarse and tired.

Itachi looked at Kabuto, he had dark circles under his eyes, the black eye and broken nose were still very prominent and Itachi made note of the torn up and bruised knuckles. "What do you want?" he asked icily.

Kabuto sighed, he knew that he would regret this later, "I've come to tell you that I'm not going to fight you anymore." He clenched his fists, "I never wanted to in the first place." He stood there, wishing that someone would say something.

Itachi narrowed his eyes, he could be lying to get him off his guard. "There is nothing you can say that will make me believe you." He stood up and faced Kabuto, "you attacked my friend, you stole from me, and you attacked me. That doesn't just stop for no reason, if you want me to believe you better have a good explanation."

Kabuto took in a deep breath, "my parents found out that we would be roommates and they saw it as an opportunity to get the upper hand, so they forced me find out anything I could and to learn about your secrets, they threatened me with not paying for school."

"Why were you late for the semester?" Itachi asked in a cold voice.

"I tried to tell them I wouldn't, but they…don't take no for an answer." His voice faltered, and he flinched at the memory of that week.

Itachi started to understand, they were the same. Pawns being used for their parent's ambition, forced to fight battles and assigned to fates that they couldn't choose. He pushed these thoughts to the back of his head, now was not the time empathy. "You could have killed Orochimaru if Hidan hadn't stepped in, I can't just forgive that." Then he walked past Kabuto towards the exit of the cafeteria. He needed to focus on his parents coming, not on Kabuto. He remembered Kabuto's knuckles, he could tell that Kabuto had already beaten himself up enough about what he had done. He still didn't want to feel bad, Kabuto was going to cause him more trouble with his father than he was already in.

Orochimaru and Hidan remained sitting, neither of them looked at Kabuto. They were unsure of what to do, it seemed like it was up to Itachi whether they could trust this guy or not and Itachi had made it clear that he didn't want anything to do with Kabuto.

"Orochimaru…" Kabuto started, "I…I-I'm sorry, I didn't want to…"

Orochimaru blinked and continued to stare into his breakfast, he wanted to forgive him, he really did. He hated Kabuto because of what he had done, but he had no personal ill will against him.

"Kabuto," Hidan said calmly, "neither of us really know exactly why you did what you did. We know it was never about us, so we can forgive you. But it's Itachi that you have to talk to, he was the one you were trying to learn stuff about. Yeah, you used Orochimaru, you scared him and hurt him, that's up to him to decide whether he wants to forgive it or not." He looked at Orochimaru and continued, "as far as things go on my end, I don't really care. If someone hurts my friends I'll fight for them, if you keep to your word and leave them alone then I won't bother you."

Kabuto soaked this is, then nodded and turned to leave. He had tried, but he understood, he would just have to avoid them as much as possible. He remembered the phone call from the day before, there had been yelling and threatening. He was glad he was at school and not at home, he couldn't get hit over the phone.

"Who was that?" Anko asked.

"Remember on Halloween how I passed out?"

"Yeah."

"That's who did it." Hidan stood up to leave, "we better find Itachi, he seems upset today, I want to keep an eye on him."

Orochimaru and Anko nodded and got up to follow Hidan out of the dining hall. There was an air of foreboding throughout the rest of the morning, Itachi was antsy and kept on opening his textbooks to study, then throwing them off his desk in frustration. Orochimaru tried to calm him down by offering to do yoga, Hidan offered to go and have a skate session with him, and Anko tried to make jokes and be pleasant, but nothing seemed to work.

Itachi leaned against a lamppost in front of the student center. There was one minute until noon. He breathed in deeply, there was a sharp pain in his side and he remembered that he had a bruised rib. He breathed out. He leaned back and looked up at the overcast sky, the weather seemed appropriate, it was cold and gloomy, it couldn't have been more perfect.

He checked his phone again, noon exactly. At the same moment, a small gray car pulled into the parking lot, it pulled into a spot near the exit, a good logical spot for a quick getaway. Itachi saw the back door open and heard it slam shut followed by the sound of feet pounding against pavement, he smiled.

"Itaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaachiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!" a small person launched themselves at Itachi.

He caught the figure easily and hugged it tightly. "Sasuke, I'm glad you're here." He couldn't help but tear up a little, he felt whole again now that he was back with his little brother, it felt like he had meaning again, someone to protect instead of thinking about what he had been through. He didn't care that his injuries hurt, he squeezed Sasuke tighter and enjoyed the few moments of peace.

"Itachi, I can't breathe" Sasuke choked. Then he slowly peeled himself out of Itachi's arms.

A man and a woman walked up behind Sasuke, and Itachi put on the best smile he could muster, "mom!" he paused and managed to get out, "father." Then he swallowed, "I'm glad to see you."

His mom smiled and gave him a soft hug, "it's nice to see you dear," she pulled back and looked at his face, concern showing in her eyes, "Itachi, what happened..."

He shrugged, "oh it's nothing important."

His father stepped forward and put a hand on his shoulder, Itachi winced. "Itachi, nice to see you."

"Yeah," he turned and started to walk towards the student center, "so, what did you guys want to see first?" he tried to sound cheery, for Sasuke's sake, but he knew he wasn't doing a very good job.

They all walked through the student center, Itachi in the lead with Sasuke who excitedly point out things and ran around then Itachi's parents following, his mom smiling and his father with his usual scowl and crossed arms. They walked down the path past the pond, Itachi remembered the Halloween night fight and took a deep breath, he couldn't think about Kabuto right now.

"You have a pond on campus?!" Sasuke's excited voice came out of nowhere.

"Yeah," Itachi laughed, "though students aren't allowed to swim in it…"

Sasuke laughed, "You must have so much fun here!"

"It's a lot of work too, but having people to work with makes it better. Keep your grades up Sasuke and you can come when you are old enough." Itachi hoped that his words would stick with Sasuke, but there was no way to tell.

They eventually made it back to the dormitory and they all went up to Itachi's room where Orochimaru was scrolling through Wikipedia again. Itachi stepped in, "Oro, I want you to meet my family."

Orochimaru looked up, then his eyes widened. In front of him was a fifth grade kid, a woman who looked really nice and friendly, and a man who was possibly the scariest looking individual he had ever seen. Orochimaru blinked, "uh, hi…" he didn't know why he was getting so embarrassed, "I'm Orochimaru, I'm Itachi's roommate." He waved awkwardly and tried his best to smile.

"Nice to meet you." Itachi's mother said, "You must have a lot to put up with considering Itachi's odd morning schedule," she laughed and reached over to shake hands.

Orochimaru took her hand and laughed nervously, "oh, it doesn't bother me at all, I'm a heavy sleeper." He looked down and saw the kid staring up at him with wide eyes, he went down on one knee so he could look him in the eye, "You must be Sasuke. I've heard a lot about you!" He smiled, so this was the kid who had hidden all the pictures in their room.

"You're friends with my brother!" Sasuke smiled wide then hugged Orochimaru around the neck, "I'm so glad he has friends! Please take care of him!"

Itachi turned bright red, "S-Sasuke…"

Sasuke turned to look up at Itachi, "What? You've never had any before!"

Orochimaru laughed and stood up then put a hand on Sasuke's head, "don't worry about your brother, though he takes care of me more."

There was a cough from the back of the group, "Orochimaru, I am Itachi's father." The voice was cold and stern. "I assume that you study with my son. If I find that his grades suffer because of any distractions-"

"Father." Itachi interrupted, his face was expressionless.

There was a knock at the door and Itachi moved to answer it, when he opened the door Anko was standing there, "Itachi, I was wondering if…" she stopped, then noticed the crowd of people in the dorm. "Ah, I can come back later…" then she turned to leave.

"No, Anko, what is it?" Itachi asked, anything to get some sort of relief from the tension in the room.

"I uh… can't really… talk about it here…" she said and turned bright red, then sped walked back down the hallway.

"Who was that?" Itachi's mom tapped him on the shoulder, "is that your girlfriend?"

Itachi's face turned more red than before, "n-no."

"We didn't pay thousands of dollars to send you to college so you could get a girlfriend, Itachi." His father's voice cut in.

"How about I show you the library now." Itachi said, trying to change the subject as quickly as possible.

"Actually, Itachi, I need to talk to you."

Itachi's blood ran cold, so this was it. There was no avoiding it anymore. He looked over at Orochimaru and gave him a slight nod, "Sasuke, stay with Oro for a bit, he wants to show you what he is learning in class."

Sasuke looked up, his eyes were wide, "I-Itachi…"

"Stay here Sasuke." Itachi turned and walked out of his room, his father followed. They left the dormitory and went to talk next to the pond.

"So what are you studying?" Sasuke looked over at Orochimaru.

"I'm a biology major, so I study animals and humans mostly," he laughed nervously, "uh, do you like snakes Sasuke?"

"They are ok I guess. Why?"

Itachi's mom lingered by the door, "ah, Orochimaru? Is it ok if I wait in the lobby for them to come back?" she sounded nervous.

"Yeah, it's just back down the stairs and to your left. If you'd like, I could ask Anko to wait with you?"

"Thank you but no." she refused, then turned and left without any further explanation.

Orochimaru looked both ways then closed the door to the room, "So, do you want to meet my friend Karin?"

Sasuke gave him a confused look, "sure…"

Orochimaru opened the closet and reached all the way to the back and carefully took Karin out of her Aquarium then brought her over to Sasuke. "She's a grass snake, she is mostly harmless though can be cranky at times. Do you want to hold her?"

Sasuke's eyes grew wide with wonder, "can I!?"

"Here," Orochimaru sat on the floor and motioned for Sasuke to do the same. When Sasuke was seated he gently placed the snake in his hands and watched her slither around.

"So smooth…" He brought the snake closer to his face. Karin stared into one of Sasuke's big black eyes and held his gaze. She slowly slithered forward and gave the tip of his nose a tentative lick.

Orochimaru was amazed, he'd never seen Karin accept a person so quickly, she must like him, just like Itachi, he thought. He let Sasuke hold Karin for a while longer, then she started to get antsy.

"I should probably put her back," Orochimaru said and took her back, then carefully placed her in her aquarium. When he turned back around he saw Sasuke looking out the window. "What are you looking at, Sasuke?"

Sasuke turned back around, "I'm worried. My dad was pretty upset on the way here." His eyes were starting to fill with tears, "I don't want Itachi to get hurt…"

Orochimaru didn't know how to respond, he just stood there and looked down at the kid who was trying his best not to cry. He walked over and knelt down so was eye level with Sasuke again, "it's ok to cry Sasuke."

It was like a dam had been released, Sasuke threw himself forward into Orochimaru's arms and sobbed uncontrollably into his shoulder. This wasn't exactly how Orochimaru had pictured spending time with Sasuke going, but what the kid had said bothered him, why would he think that Itachi was going to get hurt?

There was another knock on the door, Orochimaru looked up and saw Hidan and Anko peeking into the room. He gave them a look that said "help" and they quietly walked in. Hidan had his board and Anko had her backpack like they were about to leave.

Sasuke sniffled then looked up and saw the two new people walk in. he quickly wiped his eyes and pretended to smile. "Hi," he said quietly, "who are you?"

"My name is Anko, and this is Hidan. We're friends of Itachi. Are you ok little man?" she smiled and put her hand on his shoulder.

"I'm fine!" he noticed Hidan's board, "whoa… is that a real skateboard?!"

Hidan smiled, "yeah, you want to try it out in the hallway?"

Sasuke hesitated, "well, I'm not sure if my dad will be ok with it…" then he looked at the board again.

Hidan put his hand on Sasuke's head, "It'll be out little secret. We can have Anko on look out in case anyone comes!"

Sasuke's face brightened, "Ok!" and he followed Hidan and Anko out to the hallway.

Orochimaru stayed back, he was worried about Itachi. He had noticed that he had been acting weird since he found out his family was coming and it didn't make him feel better after he heard Sasuke talk about Itachi getting hurt. He wished he could have followed Itachi and made sure that he was ok. He sighed, then went out to the hallway to catch up to Hidan, Anko, and Sasuke.

Itachi led his father to the far side of the campus pond, he wanted to get as far away from people as possible, specifically out of sight of the window of his dorm room. He stopped walking and turned to face his father who stood with his arms crossed and an all too familiar frown on his face. Itachi breathed out and clenched his fists. "What do you want?"

His father stood and looked him up and down for a few minutes before talking. "I see that you haven't learned how to respect your father while you have been here." He paused and uncrossed his arms. "Tell me about the fight."

Itachi blinked, he figured his father would guess what had happened, at least how he had gotten hurt, "just some Halloween prank, that's not what you came here to talk about."

"You won I hope."

"Yeah, but what does that matter. You told me you would leave Sasuke out of this if I agreed. You lied!" Itachi took a step forward, He could feel himself getting angry, and his control was slipping away.

"It's clear to me that you aren't going to uphold your end of the deal on your current path. You disrespect me, you don't train, you study sh*t like philosophy instead of something that could actually be helpful for what you claim to be your future! I can't have someone who has no discipline and a head full of stuffy quotes at the head of this family! Sasuke is the future for the Uchiha and he will be stronger than you ever could be!" He took a step toward Itachi, "I'm here to tell you that you aren't coming back here next semester."

The words stung, coming to this school had been the closest to freedom that he'd ever had, "You can't control me!" Itachi shouted at the top of his lungs, he was digging his fingernails into his palms so hard that he felt his hands start to bleed.

Itachi didn't see it coming. There was a smack and he felt his neck twist painfully to the side. The bruise on the side of his face throbbed and started to sting. He stood, his hands were still in fists, he didn't make a sound just clenched his jaw and looked down.

"Enough!" His father yelled. His voice sounded like thunder, deep and gravelly. "I pay for your school and I can stop paying for it! You're coming home and you're helping me train Sasuke to be the head of the family!" He stepped closer to Itachi so that his face was a few inches away, "Though I don't know how much you could help train him since you haven't even mastered your own eyes yet. Oh yes, he didn't tell you on the phone but Sasuke already activated his eyes so you can stop trying to prevent it." his father smirked, "at least one of my children has promise."

Itachi reacted on instinct, he reached out and grabbed the front of his father's shirt, "Leave Sasuke alone!" he shouted and he shoved his father away, his face twisted into a snarl and he tensed his body, "I gave you what you wanted! I promised I would come back and take over! But nothing I do is ever enough! I won't let you do the same thing to Sasuke! You said you wouldn't train him, that he could be normal! You stole my life, don't steal his too! And if you can't agree to back off, then I will do whatever it takes to make sure he does have a normal life! You've already created one monster, isn't that enough for you!?"

"You could never be enough!" His father roared, "Sasuke is my son! You say you agreed but you fought me every chance you got! If you had just accepted your fate you wouldn't be permanently scarred, I took care of you! I trained you!"

"Cutting your child's face isn't taking care of them!"

"You had to learn your place!"

"I was 10!"

"Age doesn't matter!"

They were both yelling as loud as they could, all his life Itachi had just accepted the yelling and everything else that his father had done because Sasuke was around and if he had fought back Sasuke would have gotten dragged into it. Now that Sasuke wasn't there he felt like he could finally stand up for himself.

"I'm done with you! You're hopeless! If you want to fight with me so badly then fight me!" His father yelled.

"I'm not going to fight you! If I did I would turn into the monster you are!" Itachi yelled back.

His father yelled and raised his hand again then swung. Itachi flinched, but felt nothing. He looked up and saw a figure standing between him and his father. It had dark gray hair pulled into a ponytail.

"Itachi, are you ok?"

He heard Kabuto's voice, he was so surprised that all he could do was stand there and stare at Kabuto's back. "I-I'm fine."

"Who the hell are you? This is none of your business!"

"Itachi, please leave."

Itachi nodded, he didn't know how this was going to end. He wanted to stay, but he knew that he didn't want to argue with Kabuto, even if he was part of the dragon triad. He turned and started walking away.

"Itachi! Don't you dare walk away from me! If you walk away now I'll make your life hell! You think this will solve everything, but you're still coming home next month and I won't stop training Sasuke!"

He kept walking, he knew it wouldn't solve anything and that it very well make things worse, but he was done. His mom would be worried and of course he would have to try to tell something to Sasuke. He heard footsteps behind him and he started walking faster.

"It's ok Itachi, it's just me." Kabuto's voice was soft. "Don't stop walking, just keep going."

They didn't know where they were walking to, but they ended up behind the dormitory next to the dumpster. Itachi looked over at Kabuto, "why?" he asked, he didn't really know what else to say.

"I don't know," Kabuto slouched against the wall and looked up at the sky, "maybe because you were trying to fight back." He paused then looked over at Itachi, "I'm not a stranger to violent parents, especially controlling ones. The difference is you still could leave, I'm stuck. I can never leave my family or the triad. If I could help someone not have the same fate that I do I would do everything in my power to help them." He looked down at the ground, "you said you didn't want to become a monster, but I already am one."

Itachi was silent, he looked down at Kabuto, "thank you. For helping me, and I forgive you." He turned to go back into the dormitory, "If you ever need anything, you know where my room is." He walked into the building and back up the stairs.

He found Sasuke with Orochimaru looking through Wikipedia, "Sasuke, I need to talk to you."

Orochimaru turned and saw Itachi's face and his jaw dropped open, "I-Itachi… y-you should l-l-look in the m-mirror…"

"It's ok, I already know I look like hell, I don't need a reminder. Sasuke, come here." Sasuke got up and slowly walked over to where Itachi was standing. Itachi knelt down so that he could look Sasuke in the face, "stuff might be different for you at home from now on…"

"Itachi, your eyes…" Sasuke interrupted.

Itachi blinked, "Sasuke I really need you to listen right now."

"No Itachi! Look!" Sasuke reached over and opened the closet door so Itachi was looking straight into the mirror.

He stared, his eyes were red as if he'd had an episode, but he hadn't felt anything. There was no stinging or burning, and no panic attack. He was confused, did it have to do with the extra symbol that had appeared? He had certainly gotten angry enough to trigger his eyes and he had been surprised that he hadn't. He shook his head, he could think about it later.

He looked back at Sasuke, "I'm afraid that dad might get a bit hard on you now. I want you to know that if anything ever happens, if he hits you or hurts you in any way, you call me right away." He looked into Sasuke's wide eyes, "Can you promise me?"

"Y-yes… but Itachi, why would..." He broke off as a figure appeared at the door.

"Sasuke, it's time to go."

Itachi stood and glared at his father. He waited until Sasuke ran down the hall to say goodbye to Hidan and Anko then he stepped close to his father, "If I hear that you have laid a finger on Sasuke, I'm coming home and bringing him back here."

His father turned and walked away down the hall, then descended the stairs and was out of sight. He wished that he could have said goodbye to his mom, but she would know. Sasuke came running back down the hall and wrapped his arms around Itachi's waist.

"I love you Itachi, I'm going to miss you until the semester ends!"

"I love you to Sasuke." Itachi gave Sasuke a long hug, then watched him run down the hall and down the stairs. He had the odd feeling that Sasuke would never be the same again, that this was the last time he would be able to talk to his loving younger brother. He felt tears coming, they slowly trickled down his face and fell to the floor.

He turned and went back into his room. He slowly changed into his shorts and t-shirt and crawled under his blankets, it was only five but he was exhausted. He lay in bed and let the tears crawl down his cheeks, the side of his face was still stinging from being hit, it hurt more than any cut or bruise he'd ever gotten before.

Orochimaru didn't know what had happened but he knew that it had been bad. He left the room and came back shortly after with a paper cup of chamomile tea and put it next to Itachi's bed then grabbed his heated blanket and threw it over Itachi and plugged it in. Then walked over and opened the window. Orochimaru sat down next to Itachi on the bed with a science book and started doing some extra reading. He knew that Itachi wouldn't want to be alone, so he stayed there all night. He fell asleep slouched over his book, one hand resting on Itachi's shoulder.

Panic and Snowflakes

Things never really returned to the way they had been before Itachi's family had visited. Itachi became more distant and more focused on his studies, Orochimaru started a new project that he didn't tell anyone about, and Hidan and Anko spent more time with each other than anyone else.

Orochimaru sighed, nothing would ever be the way it had been before the Halloween party where everyone was happy and relaxed. He still blamed himself for ruining it. It was his project that started this whole mess in the first place. He looked over to the closet where Karin's aquarium was, his new project would be better and no one would get hurt from it, in fact, he was planning on helping people with it. After meeting Itachi's family, even if they weren't a very happy family like he had originally thought, it made him miss his parents more than ever.

He pulled a book about snakes off of his shelf and flipped through it, pausing at a picture of a discarded skin. He could do this, it couldn't be that hard, right?

Itachi walked back into the room and sat down at his desk to study, he didn't even acknowledge Orochimaru's presence. It had been two weeks and his face was almost completely healed now, as well as all the other injuries from his fight with Kabuto.

Orochimaru sighed and looked back down at the picture, yeah he would help people. Then he packed his bag to head to the library, he had trouble being in the same room with Itachi, the air would get thick and tension would build. He grabbed his jacket and was about to leave the room when he heard Itachi speak to him for the first time in a few weeks.

"Orochimaru," the voice was soft, "I…I'm sorry you had to… see everything…" He was looking down at his notebook, but his fists were clenched and his jaw was set.

Orochimaru took a step toward Itachi's desk and put a hand gently on his shoulder, he knew that Itachi wasn't ok and he hated it when Itachi tried to hide it. "It's ok, please don't blame yourself…" he paused, "I started a new project… I think I can help you with it…"

"Don't drag me into your research again." Itachi was quiet but his voice had an underlying hint of anger.

Orochimaru stepped back and winced, Itachi was still mad at him. It made sense. "I'm sorry, I've said it hundreds of times now… I don't know what else I can do, I stopped, and this has nothing to do with you now… I just think you could benefit from it…"

Itachi stared at the wall in front of him, he knew he couldn't take out his anger on Orochimaru and he wouldn't be surprised if Orochimaru stopped talking to him because of it. He breathed in and closed his eyes, "I'm sorry, I don't know where that came from." Then he stood up, "I need to go to the library too, maybe we could study together?" He grabbed his backpack.

Orochimaru gave him a half smile, "yeah. That would be nice." He noticed that Itachi's eyes had changed to red, it had been happening a lot more often since the side effects had mysteriously stopped.

They walked over to the library and found their old spot in the biology section and settled down. The library was warm and quiet with soft yellow lights, it was the most at ease that they had felt in weeks.

Itachi got up to find some more sources and came back with an armful of books on philosophy. He looked over at Orochimaru's books they were about cellular regeneration, snakes, and the theory behind immortality. "What are you studying?" he asked, then remembered their conversation about snakes.

Orochimaru looked embarrassed and then shifted his gaze to the floor, "I'm going to do it Itachi; I'm going to find out how to become immortal." He looked up, "and when I do I'll show it to the rest of the world and no one will ever lose anyone ever again."

Itachi stared at him, he looked incredulous, "Oro… that's impossible…" His friend had gone insane!

"Not as impossible as people think, if there was a way get yourself a new body and you transferred over your consciousness and thoughts, you could just keep changing and then live forever…" He looked at Itachi's face which just got more and more disturbed as he talked.

"But where would you get the bodies?" Itachi asked,

"I thought about snakes and how they just outgrow theirs but no amount of genetic manipulation would make it possible for humans to do that." Orochimaru looked back at his books, "that's what I'm trying to figure out now…"

Itachi sat down with his research and started to flip through books and take notes. Orochimaru was crazy, but he couldn't blame him. Oro never talked about his parents and avoided talking about his uncle as much as possible. He guessed that growing up hadn't been easy for Orochimaru either. "Oro…" he was hesitant to ask, but he needed to know, "what happened to your parents?" he asked quietly.

Orochimaru paused his reading but didn't look up. "They were…they died." He said, then stood up, "I have to go find some more books. I'll be back."

He walked away down the aisle and toward the bathroom. He locked himself in and leaned back against the door. He stopped himself from blinking for as long as he could, but eventually he couldn't stand it anymore, he blinked. The images came rushing back, the blood, the smell of iron, his scream, leaning over his mother's body. He opened his eyes, he was sweating and breathing hard.

He leaned over the sink and turned the faucet on, he splashed water on his face and stared into the mirror. He looked at his face, he leaned in closer and gazed at his big green snake eyes. A spray of blood came from nowhere and splattered across the mirror. Orochimaru jumped back in terror and hit one of the stall doors. He looked at the mirror again, it was clean.

He shook his head, he had to stop thinking about this. He sat down on the floor and realized that he was shaking. "Have to stop. Can't think about it. Have to breathe." He repeated to himself over and over again.

There was a soft knock on the bathroom door, "Oro… I didn't mean to upset you… I'm sorry…" Itachi's voice was quiet. "I won't bring it up again… I guess we are both broken."

Orochimaru covered his face but kept his eyes open, "Itachi, I'm scared. I don't want to die. I don't want to lose anybody else." He said this almost inaudibly, "please don't ignore me anymore, I know you're upset and I know that you want to be alone. But if you're alone, it makes me alone too, and neither of us can make it like that…"

"I know…" Itachi answered from the other side of the door.

"Please don't be mad at me."

"I'm not mad at you, Oro. I'm mad at myself and at…I just can't keep it in very well. Please open the door."

Orochimaru slowly picked himself up and unlocked the bathroom door then opened it and faced Itachi, "I know it was beyond hard for you, and you need time to heal, so please take your time. Just don't shut me out." He hugged Itachi, then pulled away. "I think I need to go find my book now…"

Itachi just stood there and let Orochimaru pass, he hadn't expected that, He thought about Sasuke, he hadn't gotten any phone calls, texts, or e-mails. He hadn't found anymore pictures either. He hoped everything was ok.

He turned and walked back to where they were studying, He saw Orochimaru there already, flipping through another book and scribbling down notes. He might not have Sasuke, but he could do his best to take care Orochimaru. He needed someone to take care of, someone to make him forget about himself.

Itachi and Orochimaru were doing work in their room after lunch, slowly they were once again becoming comfortable in each other's presence. Orochimaru noticed a change in Itachi's attitude, he seemed less burdened than before. Of course, Orochimaru had to keep himself thinking about other things so he wouldn't remember…that night. He busied himself with his research and Wikipedia.

They had been working and relaxing for a while when there was a frantic knock on their door. They looked at each other, neither Hidan nor Anko had visited in weeks and Itachi hadn't seen Kabuto around campus almost at all. Itachi's desk was closer to the door, so he got up and opened it slowly.

Anko came sprinting into the room, she looked panicked. Her hair was messy and it looked like she had picked up whatever she could find first in her room for clothes. She was out of breath and looked about to cry. "Guys! I need you to do something for me! And you can't tell Hidan about it!"

Orochimaru stood up and offered his chair to Anko, but she ignored it and sat on Itachi's bed, messing up the pristine blankets. "Uh, what do you need?" Orochimaru asked, reaching for the tissue box just in case.

"Close the door…" she looked around nervously.

Itachi closed and locked the door, hoping that it would make her feel more at ease knowing that no one could interrupt.

Anko took a deep breath, "I-I need you to get something for me at the convenience store off campus."

"Yes?" Orochimaru tried to get her to say more but she was quiet for a long time. She pulled her knees up to her chest and started to hug them. "What do you need us to get for you?" He started to worry, he didn't know what girls needed…

"I…I need you to get me a pregnancy test…" She turned bright red and tears started to flow. Orochimaru just handed her the tissue box.

Itachi started to look uncomfortable, "um, so…"

"Please… if I go, people will start to talk and… it's hard enough being a girl. I can't risk Hidan seeing me buy it, he'll freak out… I'm freaking out… I can't imagine how it could have happened, we always use protection…"

Itachi gave a panicked look to Orochimaru who looked just as uncomfortable. "um, yeah. We can get you one…" He really didn't want to hear any more about what Hidan and Anko may done or not done.

"So, why do you think you're…pregnant?" Orochimaru asked cautiously, he blushed slightly when he said this.

"It hasn't come yet… I've been consistent since I started having it and now all of a sudden it's not here!" she said between sobs.

Orochimaru looked confused, "What hasn't come yet?" Then looked at Itachi for help. Itachi rolled his eyes at Orochimaru.

"Her period." Itachi said and gave Orochimaru an annoyed look.

Orochimaru turned a darker shade of red, "o-oh… I k-knew that…"

"When do you need it by?" Itachi asked.

"As soon as possible, I need to know before the semester ends." She sniffled, "If I need to tell my parents, I need some time to prepare…" Then started to cry again.

"We'll head out now," Itachi sighed. It was better than hanging around only studying. "Come on Oro, let's go."

Orochimaru looked relieved and grabbed his jacket. "You can stay here if you want to… feel free to use as many tissues as you need." He said and almost sprinted for the door.

Itachi followed after him, "make yourself at home, you can read anything and use Oro's computer if you want." Then he left and closed the door behind him.

They could hear Anko start to cry harder through the door, they looked at each other and started speed walking out of the building, it was best that they got this over with as quickly as possible.

They slowed down when they were out of the building. They started walking down the path that led off campus. Every day the weather got colder and every passing day Itachi thought about what his father had said, that he wouldn't be coming back. It was getting towards the end of November and finals were coming soon, then he'd have to go home and he would never see his friends again. He sighed and pushed this thought out of his head.

"I don't like how cold it is." Orochimaru's voice broke the silence. "Why can't it always be warm and pleasant?"

"I like it when the seasons change, you never know what a new one will bring." Itachi replied, he could see his breath as he talked.

"It's still cold…" Orochimaru pulled the collar of his jacket up higher and buried his nose in his scarf.

Itachi was quiet, he didn't blame Orochimaru for not liking to be cold, he looked part reptile anyways why not act like it too. He sighed, the sun was starting to go down and the sky turned brilliant red and orange, the skyline of the campus was silhouetted black against the bright colors. It was a pretty peaceful evening.

"Itachi…are you going to go back home after the semester ends?" Orochimaru's voice was slightly muffled by the scarf.

He didn't answer right away, he took a deep breath in and breathed out, watching his breath spiral around in the cold air. "I have to. Even if I had somewhere else to go, I couldn't leave Sasuke there alone."

Orochimaru nodded, "well, if you ever need a place to go, you and Sasuke both, you can come and stay with me and my uncle… he doesn't really do anything so he wouldn't mind."

"Thanks Oro. I'll remember that." Itachi looked at him and gave him a half smile.

They walked up to the convenience store, the lights were bright in the windows and it looked warm and cheery. A bell over the door rang as they entered, "Welcome!" there was a bored sounding voice from behind the counter. They looked over and saw a girl with short pink hair reading a magazine at the register. She looked up, then her eyes widened "You!" she pointed at Itachi, "You ditched me!"

Itachi looked confused, "um, do I know you?"

This seemed to make the girl madder, "Ugh! The nerve of some people!" She came out from behind the counter, "I danced with you on Halloween! And you left me in the middle of the dance floor!" she walked right up to Itachi and stuck her finger in his face, "do you know how embarrassing that was!"

Itachi was very confused, "I was about to throw up, would you rather I do it on you?" he thought this would help. It didn't.

The girl's face twisted in rage, "How dare you!"

Orochimaru stepped between them, "sorry, but we're just here to get one thing and then we'll be out of your way," he smiled and tried to laugh it off. He started to nudge Itachi down one of the aisles and the girl just stood there snarling.

They ducked into the aisle with birth control methods and tampons, "who is she?" Orochimaru whispered.

"That's the girl that dragged me onto the dance floor at the Halloween party…" Itachi looked over his shoulder nervously, "I had no idea what she even looked like because I was panicking so much at the time."

"She's kind of cute, you should ask her name."

Itachi gave him a weird look, "why?"

"Because you obviously meant something to her if she remembered you from a month ago."

"I think she's just mad…" Itachi paused and thought about it, she was cute… but was it worth it if he wasn't even coming back? He sighed, he could at least try to make her feel better.

They scanned the shelves and quickly found a pregnancy test, then walked back up to the front of the store. The girl sent them and annoyed look.

Itachi placed the pregnancy test on the counter, "look, I'm sorry I ran away. I honestly didn't even know what was happening that whole time… I don't do the best in loud rooms with lots of people."

The girl looked down at the box on the counter, then she got sad, "its ok. I get it. I hope you're excited to be a father."

Itachi was shocked, "I…. no….it's….."

Orochimaru started laughing, "Don't worry! It's for a friend!"

Itachi turned bright red and started looking everywhere but at the girl, he couldn't think of anything to say.

The girl started to look uncomfortable then smiled shyly, "well, in that case, my name is Sakura." She offered her hand and Itachi shook it. "If it means anything, I thought you were a great cat at the party." She dropped the pregnancy test into a plastic bag and handed it to Itachi.

"Th-thanks…"

"Oh!" she tore the receipt off the machine and scribbled something on the back, "In case you have any emergency convenience store needs and it's closed. My dad owns it so I can get you anything you want." She handed him the receipt and winked.

"Uh…um… o-o-ok…" Itachi was flustered, he hadn't expected this.

"Thanks!" Orochimaru said and started pushing Itachi to the door.

They left quickly and started to walk towards campus again. They decided they should probably get back as soon as possible, for Anko's sanity. The stars were shining brightly around the clouds that started to fill the sky. The air felt icy and Orochimaru shivered.

There was a muffled beep as Orochimaru's phone went off. He checked it, "its Hidan… he wants to know if we have seen Anko around…."

"Tell him we saw her head to the dining hall. That should keep him away from our room for a little while."

Orochimaru nodded and started typing quickly. As he did a few snowflakes fell down from the sky.

Itachi looked up as the snow started to come down, he allowed himself a small smile as he felt the snowflakes land on his face. "I think it's the first snow of the year."

Orochimaru sniffled, "It's too cold, and I think I'm going to get sick from this walk."

"You could at least try to enjoy the night. It's not often that you actually get to be outside on the first snow of the year." Itachi laughed, Orochimaru never seemed to enjoy his surroundings much.

"Snow means cold. Cold makes me sleepy."

Itachi sighed, Orochimaru had a point. They walked back into the dormitory and headed up the stairs. They were just about to get to their floor when they bumped into Hidan.

"Hey guys! Are you sure you saw Anko go to the dining hall? I checked and she wasn't there. She's not answering her phone either." Hidan looked worried, he looked at the plastic bag in Itachi's hand, "where were you guys?"

Orochimaru thought quickly, "visiting Itachi's girlfriend."

Hidan's eyes widened. "When did that happen?" He looked at Itachi for an explanation.

"Uh, yeah. I have a girlfriend…" He looked away from Hidan, "Her name is Sakura, now you know I guess." Then he moved past Hidan, "we have some… things to do. See you around." Then almost sprinted down the hallway. Orochimaru followed closely behind.

They reached the door and knocked softly, "hey, we're back" Itachi whispered. He heard the door unlock and saw it open slightly and Anko peeked out.

"Is the coast clear?" she asked.

"Yeah."

"Good." Then she grabbed the bag and sprinted for the bathroom.

"She does know that's the men's room right?" Orochimaru asked, pulling off his scarf and jacket.

"I don't think she cares." Itachi replied then walked into the room.

They looked around, nothing seemed to be out of place. Orochimaru sighed and looked at his laptop. It was open to baby name websites. "She's really freaking out about this, I'm worried." He closed the tabs and brought back up his article on boa constrictors and sat down.

"It's a serious thing," Itachi said, then pulled out a thick novel. He was done studying for now.

"Are you ever going to call Sakura?" Orochimaru asked.

"Probably not. I don't think I'm the kind of person she wants. She's cute and lively, she doesn't need someone…" he didn't want to say broken out loud.

"I don't know, I think you could be cute together. She might bring some color into your life."

Itachi shrugged, he thought it was great that Hidan and Anko worked out, and he knew Orochimaru really liked Dr. Ramona, but he just never thought about it himself. His whole life had revolved around his family and trying his best to look out for Sasuke that he never even considered what it would be like to have a girlfriend.

The door burst open and Anko rushed in, "I'm fine! There was nothing to worry about!" she looked so relieved that Orochimaru and Itachi thought she might start crying again. She ran over and gave each one of them a hug. "Thanks for doing that for me! It means a lot to have friends who won't judge you!" then she paused and made a worried face, "Crap, Hidan is out there somewhere! I haven't answered any of his texts since this morning!" She left the room and pulled out her phone. They heard her walk back down the hallway talking to Hidan.

Orochimaru smiled, he was glad everything had worked out. It was late now and he felt like going to sleep. The cold had made him lethargic and he wanted nothing more than to curl up under his electric blanket and sleep until the next spring. He slowly got ready for bed and turned out the light on his side of the room. He crawled under the covers and closed his eyes.

Almost instantly he was back in his childhood home screaming for his mom to get up. He opened his eyes and saw the dorm room and Itachi sitting calmly reading. He groaned, this was going to be a long night.

Drifting Away

Itachi opened his eyes as he heard his alarm go off. Finals was one week away and he was behind on his philosophy readings, had lab notes to finish, and an art history paper to write. He sighed as he got up, nothing made him not think about leaving like throwing himself into his school work.

He looked over at Orochimaru's bed, it was empty. He was worried, Orochimaru hadn't been sleeping a lot recently. His new project on immortality seemed to be taking up the majority of his time. The lack of sleep had also made Orochimaru odd, he had taken to shutting himself in the library for days on end, skipping classes, and often just staring at Itachi when they studied together.

Itachi shook his head, he was probably just imagining it. He got up and got dressed, as he pulled on his shirt he glanced in the mirror, the bruises on his ribs were almost completely faded now.

As he finished pulling on clothes the door opened and Orochimaru walked in. He looked terrible: he had large dark circles under his eyes and his cheeks were starting to look sunken, like he hadn't eaten in days. He walked in and started to change into fresh clothes.

"Oro, did you get any sleep last night?" Itachi asked.

"No… I forgot." Orochimaru responded without even looking at Itachi.

"How's the project going?"

Orochimaru turned around and smiled, he looked almost crazy, "I'm so close! There is just one part about the mind transfer that I need to figure out and I'll be able to do it!"

Itachi smiled as best as he could, "that's great Oro, will you get sleep then?"

Orochimaru looked away, sadness flashed across his face, "not likely… today is…" then he stopped.

Itachi just nodded his head, his friend had told him nothing. He tried his best to be around and be positive about this new project but he felt like Orochimaru was refusing to tell him something important. It had started when he had asked Orochimaru about his parents. Since then Orochimaru was different, and it was starting to worry him.

"I… won't be in the room most of today…I have to be alone… and… yeah." Orochimaru never finished his sentence, he just picked up his bag and walked toward the door, "I'll see you around."

"Wait! Oro, don't…" but it was too late, Orochimaru had already left. Itachi sighed and pulled out his phone, he could try Hidan or Anko they might be around to study or get food or something. He had pushed everyone away for weeks, but they had always been there for him and he wanted to be there for Orochimaru. "Oro… what are you getting yourself into…" He whispered to himself, then got up to go get breakfast.

As he left the building he saw Kabuto walking down the path, he remembered Kabuto standing between him and his father and took in a deep breath, the end of the semester was coming too quickly for him. He jogged over to catch up to Kabuto, he hadn't seen him since they had talked.

"Hey! Kabuto."

Kabuto turned around and saw Itachi walking up to him, he stopped and let Itachi catch up with him on the path. "Itachi… how have you been?"

"better." He paused, "are you heading to get food?"

"Yeah, you wanna…come?" he was hesitant, stuff had calmed down between them but he still felt like Itachi was a little mad about it, and understandably so.

"Do you mind if I join? Oro is… busy."

"I saw him leave, he looks terrible." Kabuto looked down, "I don't mind if you join me. It will be nice to not having to eat alone."

"Ok." They started walking in silence, they really didn't have anything to talk about. The quiet was making Itachi uncomfortable, walking with Kabuto reminded him of the last time he had seen his father.

"Itachi… how long have you been…" Kabuto didn't want to go on but he was curious, "how long has your dad been hitting you?"

Itachi was quiet for a while. He didn't want to answer, but he felt that he owed Kabuto some kind of explanation. "He's not my dad, he's my father. He's never taken care of me like a dad would."

Kabuto stopped walking and faced Itachi, his face was serious. "How long?"

Itachi looked down, "He gets mad easily, and I'd rather it be me than Sasuke."

"How long?"

"As long as I can remember."

Kabuto sighed, then put a hand on Itachi's shoulder, "Itachi, you need to leave before it gets worse. I know you want to protect Sasuke but I think that's impossible now."

Itachi scowled, "easy for you to say, you don't know what it's like! If I don't go back Sasuke will be forced into that life in my place! I can't let that happen."

Kabuto nodded, "I understand, I just wish I'd had a little brother."

They started walking again, it was a cold morning. Itachi dug his hands deep into his jacket pockets, he hadn't expected to be talking about his home life, especially to someone he barely knew at all.

They continued walking to the dining hall in silence, and continued to say nothing all throughout breakfast. Neither felt like they had anything to talk about. They felt an odd connection, they were both very similar with how they had grown up and the lives that they were both stuck in.

Orochimaru walked into the student center, he had a stop to make before he could start his research for today. He yawned, he hadn't slept in a week, and every time he closed his eyes he saw his parents. It wasn't surprising considering that today was the anniversary.

He walked into the bookstore and looked around, then walked toward the back of the store where they were selling flowers. He picked out the freshest looking ones he could find, they a small balloon in it that read "congratulations". Orochimaru scowled and removed it, then walked over to the register.

The student at the register gave him a weird look then rang up the flowers. Orochimaru returned the look with a scowl then turned and left, today was not a good day to piss him off. He mostly just wanted to be alone.

Orochimaru shivered as he walked out into the cold morning. He didn't know where to go and he just stood in the walkway holding the flowers. He looked down at the ground and saw a large red stain. He screamed and jumped to the side. When he looked back he didn't see anything. He groaned, it had never been this bad before.

He ended up walking around the campus pond into a small clump of trees, it seemed like a good place. He quickly looked around to make sure that no one was watching and noticed that there was one tree whose bark was worn away and torn, he looked closer and saw dried blood. That's odd, he thought, but decided not to think about it.

Orochimaru sat down and leaned against the tree and put the flowers on the cold ground next to him. "Mom…dad… it's been another year." He felt his eyes fill with tears. "I know you'd be proud of me this year, I made a friend…"his voice cracked, "I miss you…you see, my friend has a family and they aren't a happy family like I thought they were. But at least he has someone to care for and someone to look after him." He paused, "I wish you guys had been there…" he sniffled and tears started to flow down his face. "It's been almost 17 years but I still can't stop seeing it, please stop tormenting me! You haunt me all the time, I can't even have friends with parents!" He stopped, suddenly aware that he had been shouting, "I-I-I'm s-s-sorry… I-I don't b-blame you… "

He stood up and put the flowers in the middle of the clearing, then kneeled down next to them, "I'm not going to let anyone else lose anyone, I've found a way to make people immortal and I'm going to try it on myself. I think… I think I found out how to transfer myself to another body. I'm still not sure who I'm going to transfer to, but it has to be someone stronger than me." He looked sadly at the flowers, "I'm weak. I've realized that this semester. I need to be strong so I can help my friends." He stood up and wiped the tears off his face, "I don't know why I look like a snake, but I don't care. All I care about is not losing anyone ever again! And…" he looked up at the sky, "if that means that I have to go around my friend's back, then I'll do it. He'll understand eventually."

Orochimaru got up and started to walk away from the flowers, a cold rain started to fall from the sky, he paused, "I love you. I love you both." Then he looked down and kept walking. He started to cry again as he walked around the pond. He walked to the library, there was a lot he needed to research.

He didn't go to the usual corner that he and Itachi had usually inhabited, it felt wrong to do work there without Itachi, and he knew that he couldn't study this with him around. He grabbed some books on the brain and headed to a dark corner, he pulled over a chair then settled down. He just started flipping through one of his books when his eyes started to flutter.

"no, not gonna fall asleep… can't fall asleep…" darkness started to fill the corners of his eyes, and he could feel his eyes tear up again, "I don't want to see it again…" his eyes closed and fell fast asleep.

He was back in his old house playing in his room, his blocks had always been his favorite to play with. He liked to build things and create things, he liked to stack them really tall and then knock them over. He had been playing for a while and was just starting to get hungry. There was an odd noise from the front of the house, a pop noise, he heard in twice.

"Mom? What was that noise?" He opened the door to his room and walked out quietly. His parents had sent him there because someone had come to the house to visit. He quietly walked down the hall way, if someone was over he didn't want to interrupt, but that noise had scared him.

"Dad? Can I play in the backyard now?" there was silence from the room ahead of him, and he had a growing sense of dread but he couldn't figure out why. He peeked around the corner, he didn't see anyone so he walked into the room. He looked down and he saw his parents face down on the floor. There was a growing puddle of red slowly oozing across the carpet.

"Mom? Dad? What's going on!?" He ran over and started to shake his mom's shoulder, "get up! I'm scared!" Tears started to roll down his cheeks and the red stained his knees, "You can't leave me! I need you!" And he buried his face in in his mom's back.

He remembered the funeral, standing with his uncle next to a small grave in a massive graveyard. The sky had been bright blue and the sun was shining down. He remembered hating the sun, the one day he hadn't wanted it to shine it had come out and been brighter than ever. He hadn't stopped crying since the he had been dragged away from his parent's bodies two days before. He blinked and saw something slither through the grass, a small white snake slowly curled up next to the grave and looked up at him.

Orochimaru knelt down, "uncle, what is that?"

His uncle bent down next to him, "that's a snake Orochimaru, and it looks like a special one. It's not often that you see white snakes around here. It's almost as if he came to bring you good luck… though I'm not sure you have any to begin with." He looked over at Orochimaru.

"It will bring me luck. I know it!" Orochimaru yelled at his uncle, "Nothing can be worse than right now!" angry tears streamed out of his large eyes.

His uncle looked at him angrily, "I told my sister not to marry your father! I told them not to stay in that town! I told them it would only bring trouble!" tears started streaming out of his uncles eyes.

"Uncle…" Orochimaru moved closer to comfort his uncle. His uncle wrapped his arms around Orochimaru's small frame and sobbed.

"They should have listened to me! Now I have to raise you! Orochimaru… Orochimaru… Orochimaru…"

"Orochimaru!"

Orochimaru's eyes flew open. He was back in the library, he had fallen asleep over one of his books. He could feel a hand shaking his shoulder. He looked down at the pages and saw that they were wet with tears.

"Orochimaru, you've been sleeping for hours!" He heard Anko's voice and looked over and saw her standing there holding a coffee in one hand and the other still on his shoulder.

"W-why are you here…" he blinked and sat back. He looked out the window and saw that it was dark. How long had he been here?

"I came to do some studying for finals and saw you come in. you were soaked and looked upset but I didn't want to bother you in case you wanted to be alone… I was about to leave and saw you sleeping but… you were crying." She bit her lip, "Itachi texted me, he said you hadn't been getting much sleep… is everything ok?"

Orochimaru looked back down at the tear-stained pages and smiled, "it will be…"

Anko took a step back, she had never seen that look on Orochimaru's face before, he was smiling but there was a wild glint in his eyes. She shook her head and pretended not to see it, he probably just needed to get some rest.

"It's late, I'll walk you back to the dorms. I have an umbrella so you won't get wet on the way back." She started to put his books into his bag for him.

Orochimaru blinked, then his smile faded away. He was tired, he had to sleep even if he had to deal with the memories. "Thanks Anko…" He got up and picked up his backpack.

"Do you want to get food? You must be hungry."

"No… I don't have an appetite today."

They left the library building and started walking down the path to the dormitory. They walked in silence. The rain made small pattering noises as it hit the umbrella then rolled off and hit the ground. Anko looked over, Orochimaru had changed. No one had noticed it, but something was driving Orochimaru mad.

They reached the dorms and Anko turned to go to her room, "hey Oro… If you ever need anything, you can just ask." Then she walked away.

Orochimaru sighed, he didn't know why people kept saying things like that, he was absolutely fine. He walked down the hall towards his room then stopped. He heard an odd familiar popping noise come from the other side of the door, his face twisted into panic and he sprinted forward and threw the door open, "Itachi!"

Itachi was sitting on his bed calmly reading, he looked up as Orochimaru crashed into the room, "is everything ok?"

Orochimaru stood in the doorway panting, "I thought I heard something in here…" he looked at the floor, "sorry for disturbing you…"

"I don't mind, I was just waiting for you to come back." He paused and looked at the floor, "I wanted to talk to you about your offer…"

Orochimaru was surprised, He put his bag down and peeled of his damp coat, "you mean about staying with me and my uncle?"

"Y-yeah…" Itachi took in a breath, "I don't think it's a good idea for me to go back… I am going to see my family for Christmas, but afterward I can't be there."

"What about Sasuke?"

"I was going to ask him when I went back, he hasn't talked to me since he was here and I'm a bit worried." He closed his book and scooted to the edge of his bed and looked at Orochimaru, "I know it's a lot to ask…"

"Itachi…" His eyes grew wide, "I-I'm glad I can help you!" he walked over and put his hand on Itachi's shoulder, "you'll be safe with me."

Itachi looked away, there was something odd about how Orochimaru was acting. Almost as if he had some plan and everything was falling into place.

Orochimaru looked at Itachi's face, a trickle of blood meandered down from his hairline and dripped off his chin. More blood started coming until Itachi's face was almost completely covered. Orochimaru screamed and jumped back.

"Oro!" Itachi stood up and rushed over to where Orochimaru lay shaking on the ground.

"Stay away!" He scrambled backwards until his head hit his bed frame, "Don't come near me!"

Itachi backed away slowly, he'd never seen Orochimaru like this before, "Oro… what's happening…"

"You're a monster!" Orochimaru's eyes were glazed over and he started sweating and hyperventilating.

The words stung, and Itachi stood up. His face was serious but sadness filled his eyes. He watched his friend start crying and knew there was nothing that he could do. "Oro, don't push me away when you need me the most…" he whispered, then sat on the floor a few feet away. He looked on as Orochimaru hugged himself and cried himself to sleep.

Itachi walked over and lifted Orochimaru into his bed. He pulled off Orochimaru's shoes and his sweatshirt, the draped a blanket over him. He sat on the edge of Orochimaru's bed and watched him sleep, his face was sad and tears were still coming out of his closed eyes. "You were there for me when I needed you, but I pushed you away… I won't let you do the same…" Then Itachi got up and turned the light off, he pulled the blankets and pillows off of his own bed and threw them onto Orochimaru's. He wrapped himself in blankets then sat down and Put Orochimaru's head into his lap. He had done this for Sasuke many times, it had always helped. He hoped it would work now.

Orochimaru's eyes snapped open. He didn't remember falling asleep but somehow he ended up in his bed with blankets on? His head wasn't on his pillow though, he slowly sat up and looked around, moonlight filtered in through the window and in the half-light he saw Itachi sitting near his head asleep, leaning against the wall. Orochimaru was confused, he didn't remember what happened, just his last conversation with Itachi about him moving in.

I'm still in my clothes, he thought. He slowly pushed the blankets back and got up then changed into athletic shorts and t-shirt. He tried to be quiet, he didn't want to wake up Itachi. He walked over to the window and leaned against the frame, he couldn't do it. Not to Itachi, what right did he have to take away what he considered most precious? He punched the wall next to the window.

Itachi sighed and his eyes fluttered open, "Oro…" his voice was soft and groggy, "You're awake…" he sat up. He slowly pulled off his blankets and got up, he walked over and put a hand on Orochimaru's shoulder, "I'm here for you." The he turned around, grabbed his blankets and crawled into his own bed.

Orochimaru turned around so that he was silhouetted by moonlight, "today was the day my parents were murdered." He sat down on the windowsill.

"I'm so sorry…" Itachi didn't know what to say, "How old were you when it happened?"

"I was three." He sighed, he didn't know why he was saying this now. "They were shot. My uncle never told me why, he just said that they should have never lived where they did. Something about paying for security." As he spoke he could see the entire scene happening in front of his face.

"Paying for security? Did you live in a dangerous area?" it was an odd reason to give for someone to be shot, though he'd had heard of it happening before especially with his father's job.

"No, not really dangerous. It was actually not far from here, in a small town. Though my uncle always said it was never safe because of mob activity or something." Orochimaru continued to stare at the floor, trying to think about something else.

Itachi felt an awful sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. "Orochimaru, where did you grow up?" He didn't want to ask but he knew he had to.

Orochimaru looked at Itachi, the question caught him off guard, "I lived on the outskirts of a town called Konoha. Then when I lived with my uncle we lived in a big city far away from there." He walked over and sat back down on his bed facing Itachi.

Itachi's blood ran cold, "K-k-Konoha…? You're sure?"

Orochimaru squinted, "yeah, my mother grew up in that town."

"Oro…I… my family…it's…" Itachi looked away from Orochimaru, "My family lives there …my father, he runs Konoha…"

Orochimaru stood up, "What are you saying, Itachi?" He could feel tears coming, he didn't want to hear what was coming next.

Itachi couldn't look at Orochimaru, he felt the weight of responsibility fall onto his shoulders like a ton of bricks. "My family… is responsible… for your parent's deaths…" He clenched his jaw and braced himself.

Orochimaru didn't say anything. He looked at the floor and cursed quietly. "Don't joke about this Itachi, it's not funny."

"I-I'm not… I've lived there my whole life… and my father…he controls a massive section of the town… he owns a big business… almost everyone works for him. Oro... I'm so sorry…"

Orochimaru looked up into Itachi's face, he looked betrayed, "y-you were my friend… m-my only friend…" His face twisted with rage, "You were my friend!" he yelled at the top of his lungs. How? How could this be happening? He said that he would be there for him, if he needed anything.

"Oro, I'm sorry! I'm so sorry! I wish I 'd known!" Itachi started to panic, he could feel his friend starting to slip away.

"Don't call me Oro! Don't call me anything!" Orochimaru was yelling and he stepped closer to Itachi's bed.

Itachi got up, he had to calm him down. "Please! You know my father is a horrible person!"

"How could you do this?" Orochimaru felt his eyes fill with tears.

"It wasn't me! Orochimaru, I can apologize for my family but it's all I can do, I was two when it happened! I had no idea!"

Orochimaru knew it was true, but he was in a blind rage. He took another step forward and grabbed Itachi's shirt, "I never want to see you again." He whispered through clenched teeth.

Itachi didn't try to fight back, Orochimaru had every right to be mad. He didn't even feel like he should try to defend himself, he felt like he deserved it.

"I don't care if it wasn't you, but my parents are dead because of your family. I grew up alone because of your family." He started shouting again, "If I could find a way to make you pay I would!" He shoved Itachi back and stood in the middle of the floor lit up by moonlight.

Itachi fell backwards and hit the side of his head on his bedframe, he saw stars for a second and tried to blink them out of his vision. His head started to throb and he felt like throwing up.

Orochimaru fell to his knees and grabbed Itachi's shirt again, "Why won't you say anything!" the tears streamed down his face and landed on Itachi's shirt. "I hate you! I hate you! I hate you!" He fell backwards and buried his face in hands. "Get out." He whispered.

Itachi picked himself up slowly, nausea was starting to overtake him. He walked out into the hallway and closed the door softly. He leaned back and slid down until he was sitting on the ground. He held his head, the throbbing increased and he felt his stomach do somersaults. He leaned over and vomited into the corner. He managed to crawl to the bathroom before he threw up again. He leaned over the toilet and coughed and gagged. After he finished he staggered to the sink and looked closely into the mirror, he was pale and sweaty and his pupils were dilated, he could just barely see the thin line of his red iris.

Orochimaru started hyperventilating as soon as he heard the door close. He was confused, lost, and angry. He didn't want to hate Itachi, he'd had one friend, only one and that was ruined. He stood and walked over to Itachi's bookshelf and found the notebook that had all of his ocular mutation research. He took it off the shelf and put it in the bottom of his drawer.

He felt no urge to sleep any more, he just sat under the window on the floor and watched the patch of moonlight move across the room. His mind was elsewhere, thinking, planning, and plotting. He had one thing on his mind: Sasuke.

Itachi walked down to Hidan's room, he couldn't spend the rest of the night in the bathroom. His eyes were vacant and he felt numb, he had never expected that his father would rip apart his life without even trying. He knocked on Hidan's door but couldn't stay standing, his head was starting to pound.

Hidan opened the door, and looked out with half closed eyes, He didn't see anyone right away, then looked down and saw Itachi lying on the floor. He looked almost ready to black out. "What the hell…" he whispered, then bent down and shook Itachi's shoulder. "Itachi, what are you doing here…"

"c-c-can I spend the night in your room," Itachi managed to get out, his voice was barely a whisper.

"Yeah, is everything ok?" Hidan was wide awake now.

"It's fine…" Itachi replied and tried to pick himself up, "I just hit my head…don't want to wake him up…" He lied, he could never tell Hidan.

"Alright." Hidan helped him into the room and threw a spare blanket and a pillow onto the floor. "I'll take the floor." Then he helped Itachi get into the bed.

Itachi didn't fall asleep, He lay there trying to not think about his throbbing skull. He started to hate his father more than he already had before. He could feel it grow inside of him and fester. Then he thought of Sasuke, and his young face and how much Sasuke had to look forward to. He would be going back home, and he would have to figure out something. But he couldn't leave Sasuke.

No Longer an Older Brother

It had been a week since Itachi left campus and he still wasn't used to being at home again. He woke up before his alarm and just lay in bed staring at the ceiling. He thought about leaving the school and having to say goodbye to his friends. He had made sure to say his goodbyes before his father had shown up with the car.

He didn't sleep in his dorm room the rest of the time he had been at school, and he had avoided Orochimaru as much as he could. They had finished up their lab hours and class time in silence. He had slept in Hidan's room and spent most of his time alone in the library. When his finals had finished he would go back to his dorm only when he knew Orochimaru wasn't there and packed his things. While putting his books into a box he noticed that Orochimaru's notebook was gone. He had sighed and ignored it.

He had found Anko and Hidan in the Dining hall and said goodbye to them the morning he left. He told them that he wasn't coming back and they were both pretty sad about it. They said they would text him and come visit but Itachi didn't really think they would.

While walking back to the dorm he bumped into Kabuto and told him thank you again. They talked for a few minutes and then Kabuto walked on, he had acted odd and distant. Itachi didn't think anything of it, news had seem to spread through all his friends that he and Orochimaru weren't talking to each other, though no one knew why.

While he was packing he ran out of space. He had walked down to the off campus convenience and bought an extra canvas bag for books. He bumped into Sakura there, it had been almost refreshing to talk to someone who was unconnected to the whole situation. He told her that he wasn't coming back and she seemed upset by this. She hugged him before he left the store and told him to call her any time for anything.

He had seen Orochimaru on his way off campus, his father helped him carry his bags and boxes to the car and they saw him walking down the path. Orochimaru had glared and stared as they walked past. Itachi couldn't make eye contact and he felt a lump rising in his throat. He remembered all the study nights, hanging out in the library, having meals and hanging out with Hidan and Anko, how Orochimaru had been there when he was hurt, when he had watched Sasuke, and most of all the first day they met: his smile, the way he had persisted on talking to him even though he had acted annoyed. He felt tears coming and he quickly looked away from his father.

Itachi's alarm went off and he sighed. He rolled over and turned it off, then swung his legs over the side of the bed. It was a cold December morning, almost a week until Christmas. It hadn't snowed since the night he had walked to the convenience store with Orochimaru. It hurt to think about.

He got up and crossed the hall to Sasuke's room and knocked softly on the door, "Sasuke, it's time to get up. Don't be late for school." Then he went down the hall to the living room. His parents were already awake and eating breakfast. He made himself tea and toast, then sat down at the table. No one said anything, that wasn't strange. His dad was quiet and he was quiet, and his mother almost never said anything without being spoken to first. Itachi remembered the loud meals in the dining hall and joking with his friends, he closed his eyes and sighed.

"Does your head still hurt?" His mother asked, as soon as he had gotten home she had sent him to bed because he'd ended up with a concussion from Orochimaru pushing him. When they asked, he refused to tell them how it had happened.

"No." He finished his food quickly and got back up, he didn't want to talk about it.

"Are you ever going to tell me how it happened?" she asked

"Yes, how does a healthy young man trained in almost every style of fighting mysteriously get a concussion?" His father added, he didn't even look up from the paper.

Itachi didn't respond and just walked back to his room. He pulled on jeans and a long sleeve shirt, boots, and grabbed a heavy coat. He walked across the hall again and knocked loudly on Sasuke's door, "Sasuke, it's almost time to go and you still need to eat."

"I'm coming." An annoyed voice responded from inside the room.

Itachi had been right when he thought that Sasuke would never be the same, he had come home and Sasuke had looked at him like he wanted him dead. Even though he was only in fifth grade, he was excelling in his martial arts classes and all his father's training. Itachi had guessed that part of this training was to convince Sasuke that he was his enemy, because that was how Sasuke treated him. Regardless he still had to walk him to school.

Itachi waited by the front door, and not too long after Sasuke dragged himself over. He looked tired and worn out, but still angry. They left the house and started to walk down the street.

"Sasuke…"

"What do you want?"

"What did father tell you about me?" he asked every morning, but he never got an answer.

Sasuke was quiet for a bit, then looked up at his older brother, "you want to make sure that I never have more power than you. You told dad that you wished I never awakened my eyes. Dad told me I would be the head of the family and that you hated it because I was the younger brother."

Itachi didn't respond, they were standing outside of the school now, and nothing that he could say would ever change Sasuke's mind. "Have a good day at school."

"You aren't even going to try and argue with me?" Sasuke looked confused.

Itachi looked down at his little brother, into the eyes that you used to look up at him when they were scared, "That's the funny thing about our father, he's right. I wish you had never awakened your eyes. But it's not because I think you're stronger, I just never wanted to drag you into the family… business."

Sasuke frowned, "you still don't want me to be the head of the family."

"I never wanted you to have to bear that burden. But father lied to me."

"He's your dad, Itachi. Why don't you ever call him that?" Sasuke looked away.

Itachi didn't answer, he pat Sasuke on the head then turned and started walking home. He thought about what Sasuke had told him. His father was clever, he had turned Sasuke against him by lying about him. It didn't matter, he would still do everything he could to prevent his father from controlling Sasuke.

As he walked he looked across the street, something caught his eye. He saw a familiar figure walking down the sidewalk. He couldn't see the face, but the posture looked familiar and the way they had carried themselves. He turned around to try and get a better look but they were gone. He shook his head, he couldn't start seeing things.

When he got home, he kicked off his boots and hung his coat up on the coat rack by the door. His mother had gone to work and his father was the only person there. As Itachi walked in his father looked up from doing work at his desk, "Itachi, you start training again today."

"Yes sir."

"You're more agreeable than usual."

Itachi closed his eyes, he didn't want to be in the same room with his father, "there is a time and a place to fight, it's not here and it's not right now." He walked back to his room, he'd have to brush up and prepare.

His father followed him to his room, "I noticed your eyes changed, you don't have episodes anymore." He almost sounded caring.

"Yeah, so?" Itachi changed into a t-shirt.

"It's time you started to learn how to use your eyes." His father turned and left after saying this.

Itachi sighed and pulled his hair back half up half down like he had seen Orochimaru do countless times when he was studying. He sat down on his bed and stared into space, he felt like nothing had changed since he left. His father was still the same. His situation hadn't really changed, the only difference was that now he was stuck, his only choice was to stay and become whatever his father had planned for him to be.

He got up and left his room then headed down the hall and down a set of stairs into the basement. The basement was converted into a training space: one half had exercise machines and the other was an open space for sparring. That's where his father was standing.

His father tossed a two rolls of bandages at Itachi who caught them easily. He started to wrap his hands tightly, this was the one place where he was officially allowed to fight his father without consequences. He stepped onto the mats and faced his father.

"It's time to tell you about your inheritance: the sharingan of the Uchiha family." His father looked across at Itachi, "you already know about it, you have heightened observational skills and quick reflexes. But the fact is that it's a well of unknown potential." His father closed his eyes then opened them, revealing red irises. "You have yet to learn how to activate them on your own, unlike Sasuke."

Itachi snarled, he just wanted to attack, he didn't need the family history lecture. "Let's just get this over with."

"Excited to start today?" his father raised an eyebrow.

"Just ready to finish this." Itachi replied and got into a fighting stance.

"Glad to see you haven't lost your form while you were gone." His father laughed, "But you will never beat me, athletics was never your strong point. That's the difference between you and Sasuke, he is actually talented at fighting. You… you just copy what you see." Then he attacked.

Itachi yelled and threw himself into sparring. It was the first chance he'd had to release his anger and hurt since that night with Orochimaru. It felt good for a little, then his father started winning. Itachi ended up on the floor with his father standing over him.

"Funny how things always seem to end here." His father smirked and started to unravel the bandages from around his hands. "We're done for today." Then he walked away.

Itachi picked himself up and started to undo his bandages as well. "You lied to Sasuke about me." He let it slip out, he hadn't meant to say it but it had escaped.

"It had to be done. You're dangerous." His father replied calmly, "besides, I can't have you winning over the heart of the hope for our family. You would fill his head with your philosophy and ideals."

"Is it bad that he would know how to think and reason?" Itachi turned around and faced his father.

"He doesn't need those skills. All he needs is what I can teach him." He stepped close to Itachi, "obviously what I taught you didn't stick very well."

Itachi took a step backwards, there was no one here to intervene if anything happened, and he didn't want to start anything.

"What? No come backs today? No smart ass quotes to shove down my throat?" he smirked, "maybe you did learn something at school." Then he turned and headed to the stairs.

"You killed my friend's parents."

His father stopped. "Itachi, don't try and pin the actions of my men to me."

"You had them killed. It doesn't matter if you pulled the trigger or not, you still made that decision." Itachi stood and glared at his father.

"When you are in my position a lot of people hate you, if you think I'll start caring just because you decided to befriend one of them you have another thing coming." He turned around to face Itachi, this had never happened before, usually Itachi was only trying to protect Sasuke.

"That's what you want Sasuke to become? Someone hated by everyone, who doesn't care if he ruins people's lives?" He raised his voice, he had to fight for this, for Orochimaru.

His father walked back towards him. "Why can't you have this much drive when you are training? If you did, you might be able to be an even match for me."

"I asked you a question. Do you want Sasuke to become what you are?"

"Yeah. He has killer instinct, I can see it in his eyes, he knows that one day he will have power and strength and he will take my place." He paused, "and you'll be there next to him, protecting him from people who don't understand."

"No. I'm not." Itachi clenched his fists. "I don't want to be part of this! You already dragged in Sasuke, I did what I could, but you dragged him in anyways. You have to choose one."

"You can't leave and you know it. Anywhere you could think of going I can find you and drag you back. You were born into this family and born with your eyes, even if you want to leave, I'm not letting you take those eyes anywhere I can't keep track of them."

"I hate you."

His father raised an eyebrow. "Oh please, Itachi. Don't act like a child."

"You had my best friend's parents killed. I can't just let that go."

"What do you want me to do? Write an apology? If they were killed it was probably for a good reason. That's just how this business works." His father was starting to get annoyed.

Itachi didn't say anything. He didn't know what else to say, he remembered Orochimaru's face when he found out, how betrayed he looked, how broken his spirit was. "You ruin people's lives! You don't even think about it! You just wave your hands and get rid of something you think is a problem, well those problems are people and they have lives and children! How can you just calmly order someone to die and not think twice about it!?"

His father punched him in the jaw. He felt his teeth crunch together and he could feel his neck strain. He staggered back and wiped blood off his lip. He straightened himself and looked back at his father, "You stole my friend's life away! And for what? Not paying you in time? How do you live with yourself!?"

He got punched in the stomach next, it knocked the wind right out of him and he fell to his hands and knees. He coughed and wheezed. "I hate you. I hate everything you do. And most of all, I hate this family." He managed to say between gulps for air.

His father leaned over and picked him up by the front of his shirt, "waiting until we are done training to actually fight is just playing dirty, Itachi." He pushed him into the wall, "feel free to hate this family as much as you'd like, but that isn't going to change anything, you have no friends to save you here, so watch your mouth." He let go of Itachi's shirt and watched his son fall to the ground then he turned and started to walk up the stairs, "once you're done sulking, don't forget to pick up Sasuke at school." Then he was out of sight.

Itachi stayed on the ground a long time. Everything hurt, especially his jaw. He was surprised that he could still talk, of course his father probably was too. That was usually where his father hit first hoping that it would make him shut up. He would tell his mom that he had gotten hurt sparring, and that would be that. He leaned back and thought about Orochimaru, there was nothing he could do to make it up to him, he couldn't even make his father slightly upset about it.

He pulled himself up and went up the stairs; his father was nowhere to be seen. At least he wasn't around. He walked slowly to his room and grabbed a towel then went to the bathroom to shower.

He let the hot water spill over him and he tried to relax, but it didn't work. He felt trapped between wanting to leave forever and knowing that he couldn't, and knowing that it was his duty to stay and work for his family and that he had promised that he would. He looked at his torso, he saw a fresh bruise forming. Welcome home, he thought.

He stepped out of the shower and pulled on clothes. He was about to leave when he remembered the long lecture Orochimaru had given on combing his hair. He sighed and started tugging at the knots with his mom's comb. He missed Orochimaru, he missed having a friend. When he figured he had gotten the majority of the tangles out of his hair he walked back to his room and threw himself onto his bed. He soon fell fast asleep.

Orochimaru walked down the sidewalk quickly, it was almost three fifteen. It was almost time. He pulled his jacket closer, he hated December, it was cold but everyone seemed to be happy about it. It was weird being back in Konoha, he had never considered it his hometown since he was only there for about two years, but as he walked he got sad. His mother had lived here, had grown up here, had given birth to a child here, and she had also died here. He scowled, he had trained himself to not think about that night, though he still saw things sometimes. He had seen Itachi earlier and it had almost caused him to start seeing things again.

As he neared the massive brick building he started seeing minivans and parents all standing around. He wouldn't really blend into this crowd very well. He sighed then tried his best to mix into the group. He felt his phone vibrate, he quickly answered it, "Are you watching?"

"Yeah," the voice on the other end sounded unsure.

"You don't have to do anything, just make sure I'm not interrupted." Orochimaru was slightly annoyed.

"I just…it doesn't feel right." The voice was quiet.

"You send you wanted to help me with my project, this is the first step." Orochimaru answered sharply, then hung up the phone. He had one minute. He pulled a vial that contained a small snake out of his pocket and checked it, when it saw him it hissed and tried to bite him. He smiled, perfect.

There was a loud ringing as the school bell signaled the end of the day and the front doors opened. A flood of middle schoolers poured out of the building and Orochimaru craned his neck and started looking, then he saw him. He waved, "Sasuke!"

Sasuke looked over confused, wasn't Itachi supposed to be here? Why was that guy here instead? He shrugged and walked over to where Orochimaru was standing. "You're one of Itachi's friends, right?"

"Yeah." Orochimaru looked down at the kid.

"Where's Itachi?" Sasuke narrowed his eyes.

"He's busy, so he sent me to come get you." He lied, and hoped that Sasuke believed it.

Sasuke sighed, "I should have guessed. Let's go." Then he started to walk down the street.

Orochimaru smiled to himself and followed Sasuke.

Itachi opened his eyes and checked the time on his phone, it was 3:20. He sat bolt upright. "Crap. I'm late." He said, then ran out of his room and threw on his sneakers and grabbed a sweatshirt, the first thing he found close by. He left his phone on his bed and ran out the door.

As he left the house he sensed that something was wrong, he looked across the street and saw a figure just watching his house. He scowled, he didn't have time for this. He jogged over to go to tell the guy to get lost.

As he got closer, the figure started to look familiar, "Kabuto?" he couldn't believe what he was seeing.

"Itachi…" Kabuto looked at him and saw the dark purple bruise on his jaw. "He hit you again." He knew he shouldn't be talking like this.

"Hello to you to." Itachi replied then started walking down the sidewalk. "I have to go pick up my brother, you wanna come?"

"Sure…" Kabuto started to panic, he didn't want to do this. He knew that Orochimaru would help him, but Itachi was his friend. He sighed, he had to get this over with. "Itachi. You aren't going to pick up Sasuke today."

Itachi turned around, "why not?" his eyes narrowed and he watched Kabuto crack his knuckles and stretch his neck. His blood froze, "are you here to fight me again?" he spat.

Kabuto said nothing, just lunged at Itachi. This time Itachi was ready, even though he was still sore from earlier that day, he was still relatively warmed up. He dodged Kabuto's first attack with ease and landed a hit on his friend's ribs, causing him to stop for a breath.

"Why are you doing this? Are you mad about last time?" Itachi was confused, he had thought that Kabuto had changed. "I thought you said you were done with this?"

"I am, I stopped working for my family, and I found a new boss and he's more reliable." He attacked again, this time he managed to get through Itachi's block and hit him on the shoulder.

Itachi had forgotten how hard Kabuto hit, he felt his shoulder dislocate and fall limply at his side, He yelled in pain.

Kabuto took this opportunity to kick Itachi's knee and he fell forward onto the pavement. He had just enough time to pop his shoulder back into place and roll away before Kabuto came at him again. His knee hurt, but at least it still worked.

"Besides, Itachi, I hate losing. It always pissed me off that you beat me." Kabuto sneered.

"Who are you working for? Why are you attacking me?"

Kabuto made another rush at Itachi who dodged it. Itachi attacked and landed Kabuto on his back, then he put a knee right under Kabuto's sternum and pinned him to the ground. "Who are you working for?"

Kabuto smiled, "wouldn't you like to know." He struggled to get up, but Itachi just pushed harder.

"Why are you doing this?" his face was stern, he needed answers.

"You're too late, I did my job, It should be done by now."

Itachi felt the blood drain from his face, Sasuke. He looked back at Kabuto, then punched him in the side of the head, knocking him unconscious.

He jumped up and started to sprint down the street, he had to get to Sasuke's school. He approached the brick building and saw a smallish figure in a long black coat standing next to a small kid. He grit his teeth and ran faster, he couldn't be too late.

As he got closer he saw Sasuke was talking calmly to the figure, why didn't he look scared? "Sasuke! Get away from him!" he shouted at the top of his lungs.

Both the figure and Sasuke turned and looked at him. Then he saw the figure's face. "Orochimaru…" he stopped mid stride, "what are you doing here?"

Orochimaru looked him up and down, "I guess you are still stronger than Kabuto after all, I did wonder."

"What are you doing?" Itachi asked, he quickly checked Sasuke, he looked fine at the moment.

"Just bringing my research to the human trials." Orochimaru replied, a cruel smile played at the corners of his mouth and he started to laugh. Then he reached over grabbed Sasuke's shoulder and pinned on of his arms behind his back.

Itachi lunged forward, but Orochimaru just pushed Sasuke between them. Itachi stopped.

"Itachi… what's going on?" Sasuke sounded scared and he looked at Itachi with his large black eyes.

"Sssh Sasuke, nothing to worry about, just a small pinch and it will all be over." Orochimaru cut in before Itachi could say anything. He pulled the vial out of his pocket and opened it, letting the tiny snake wrap itself around his finger.

"Orochimaru, whatever you're doing, just stop it. Don't drag Sasuke into this, you know this is just between you and me."

"I disagree with that, Itachi. Sasuke is part of your family isn't he? What a shame it would be if something were to happen to him."

Sasuke's eyes started to fill with tears, "Itachi…" then his face changed to shock, "Itachi! Watch out!"

Out of nowhere an arm clamped around his neck and twisted one of his arms behind his back. "You think I can't take a hit and not get back up?" Kabuto said in Itachi's ear.

"Well well, it seems like we are all here." Orochimaru laughed, then he dropped the snake down the back of Sasuke's jacket. "Itachi, you get to witness your baby brother gain more power than you could ever dream of. You see, I plan on becoming immortal, but for that I need a body to move into when this one wears out. It takes some planning so that I'll be ready with a young and strong vessel when the time comes."

Sasuke started to squirm as the tiny snake moved across his skin, then he yelled. Orochimaru smiled, "don't worry, the snake will die now that he has served his purpose."

"Orochimaru! You're insane! Leave Sasuke out of this!" Itachi struggled against Kabuto's grip.

Orochimaru walked up to Itachi and his green snake eyes locked onto Itachi's red eyes, "You always talk about wanting to protect you little brother, but now I see why your dad hits you so much, you don't seem to be very good at your job."

Itachi screamed and broke free of Kabuto's grasp and lunged at Orochimaru. He tackled him to the ground and clamped his hands around his friend's throat. "Is this what you wanted!? Revenge!?"

Orochimaru managed to smile, "it's everything I wanted."

Itachi paused, he hadn't expected to hear this.

"Everything I wanted and more. I was going over my notes and doing more research. Your family's eyes are powerful and I want them."

Itachi felt his blood run cold, "You have no idea what you're getting yourself into!" he started to squeeze Orochimaru's neck, "I trusted you! I said you were my friend! And this is how you act?" he looked over at Sasuke, he had gone pale and was starting to look like he was going to faint. Itachi looked back at Orochimaru. He pulled back his arm for a final blow when he felt Kabuto grab him from behind and throw him off Orochimaru. Itachi skidded and rolled across the pavement, then tried to stand up. His legs felt wobbly. He looked at Sasuke again, he was lying face down on the ground.

Kabuto helped Orochimaru up then they started to run. Orochimaru looked back and saw his friend struggling to stand, his face was all cut up and he looked broken. He smirked, but deep down inside he felt an ache. One tear slid down his face, then he turned around and followed Kabuto down the street and disappeared.

Itachi managed to limp over to Sasuke and pick him up, then he slowly walked home carrying his little brother's body. He inwardly cursed himself for forgetting his phone, for trying to defend Orochimaru in front of his father, and for sleeping late.

When he got home his mother rushed to the door and grabbed Sasuke. Both his parents rushed him to his room and called a doctor. Neither of them had even noticed Itachi, but he was used to it. He slowly limped to the bathroom and grabbed a first aid kit and started to patch himself up. He felt hot tears roll down his cheeks, Orochimaru had betrayed him and used him. He could feel anger growing in the pit of his stomach as he applied bandages to his cuts. No, he thought, he couldn't act irrationally about this.

He walked down the hall and hovered outside Sasuke's door, his parents were both next to Sasuke's bed. His mother was crying and his father just sat silently. Itachi turned and went into his room. Orochimaru said this had been a long term plan, which meant that he had some time to work with. Sasuke wasn't going to die, but he would never be the same after this. A plan started evolving in Itachi's head, it was long and it was complicated. Sasuke would never forgive him for it. But it had to be done.

Itachi closed his bedroom door, the first step would be to change, to train hard and become stronger, if he had to fight Sasuke to be the head of the family, then he would and he would be stronger than ever. He would find out all of the secrets of the sharingan and he would use them. He looked into the mirror, he was done being Sasuke's protector, now he would become the only thing left for him to become: Sasuke's enemy and Sasuke's motivation.