Sasuke arrives at Orichimaru's hideout, Itachi has a talk with Fugaku, Izumi decides to introduce herself to the new couple.
Chapter Text
Sasuke strode along behind Kabuto.
The medic's steps had been quickening of late, signaling to Sasuke they were nearly there.
Rolling hills under his feet, boulders he brushed past, birds and small animals he could hear busy getting a start on their day as
the rising sun warmed his blindfold, told him he had a chance to live through today.
The covering remained on his eyes, shielding him from the truth of their position, something they would not allow him to escap
e to tell about. Still, he would record the way here as best he could.
"Won't they miss this woman of yours?", Kabuto asked.
They had walked in silence for so long, the question breaking Sasuke out of his thoughts.
"I won't."
"Clearly.", the medic stated,"I meant her family, friends, her village."
Sasuke shrugged,"Her father was executed by my clan, her mother took her own life, she destroyed the lover that mattered to her
and her sister."
Kabuto was curious,"Was her father a criminal in your village?"
"Only to the Uchiha.", Sasuke responded,"He was not married to her mother or from our clan. He took her mother away and
they had two daughters. They were found and returned."
The medic could guess why the mother had taken her own life. He didn't ask.
"Your brother lives. Was she not his lover?"
Sasuke frowned,"No, she wasn't."
The smirk in his captor's voice made the young Uchiha want to gut him,"Sure about that?"
He refused to honor his tone with a reply.
Silence came again while his captor thought about his next questions.
"What about the lover and the sister?", he finally asked.
"Both sisters loved him.", Sasuke replied. She had never confessed this, but it seemed obvious enough.
Little things she said and did over time, what he had read in the reports, and her behavior about he and Itachi made it all too clear.
Treating his brother as disposable and expecting his participation snapped the final thread of her possible innocence in the
slaying of the only two people she had left as a girl.
His brother must have known.
During the walk, he came to realize why Itachi had been paired with her. Only he and their father could beat her among the
other sharingan users in the village. Her weaponized eyes spared her life and gave her a special betrothal.
She had no relative close enough to wear them for her. Itachi was impervious to her temptations.
If he'd known what she was beforehand he would have been too. Sasuke had only ever been with her and his targets, assumed it
was the same with her, until the Hokage told him that she was banging someone who outranked him.
"Stop.", his captor said, taking a firm hold of his arm.
He obeyed, felt a rapid shift in their surroundings. A new smell, minerals, damp, stale air. They were underground.
A massive chakra reached out and brushed him.
"We're here. Let's get you out of these restraints.", Kabuto said, undoing the chakra blades first.
The blindfold came off next. "Not worried about my eyes then?", Sasuke asked.
The medic shrugged,"Killing me isn't as easy as it looks. Even if you do, you'll never make it out of here alive without being let out.
He knows you're here."
Itachi wasn't surprised to see Fugaku at the training grounds.
Running his clan, the police department, and his family never kept him too busy to stay in shape and keep his skills sharp.
He nodded a greeting to his father which was returned.
"Where is Sasuke?", Itachi inquired.
"Mission", Fugaku replied. "He should be back in two days."
An image of Sakura holding her stomach and looking away in the room at the club flashed in his mind, the kunai he threw at the
target sinking in to the hilt.
Fugaku's eyes widened slightly,"Don't be too hard on him, Itachi."
He wouldn't let Sasuke drug them and not pay for it, especially Sakura, regardless of the favorable outcome.
"Establishing order is important." he replied, smirking.
Fugaku was silent.
Itachi decided to take Sakura at her word, to tell his father first.
"Sakura and I have joined."
His father let out a relieved huff,"I wondered if the delay was for Izumi."
Itachi raised an eyebrow at this. That wasn't a response he expected.
"Hiashi told me she's pregnant."
That gave Itachi pause. Picturing Izumi as a mother was disconcerting.
Hiashi, his family, and attendants came to walk through the village once a month with Fugaku.
It was billed as a celebration of peace between the two clans, and all Uchiha were required to attend,but was actually a way for
the Hyuuga to scan the crowd for new births on the way. Itachi wondered not for the first time what his father did for them in return.
The clan head elaborated, "Izumi and Yamato have been sleeping together."
Unmarried men who fathered children with Uchiha women were not allowed to raise the child.
All Uchiha were kept until born, wanted or not, and all were bound to the village. When children, alive or dead could be weapons
concessions had to be made. His heart went out to Yamato, thinking few tortures worse than being exiled from your offspring.
Izumi would be sterilized and denied marriage.
What was she thinking?
"You thought I would save her?", Itachi asked.
Fugaku nodded.
If Itachi had not fallen in love with Sakura, he likely would have married her regardless of what she'd done, only because she was
valuable in battle and he was one of the only men he knew that could resist and defeat her should she turn on them or the village.
His father shifted his feet,"Will you be having children soon, Itachi?"
Here we go. "That is Sakura's decision."
Fugaku frowned,"I don't want things to become difficult for Sasuke. You don't expect any problems?"
Itachi was silent, sickened by his father's accusation of his little brother.
Sasuke was troubled, but plotting to take his wife was unfathomable, and he would not force a child on Sakura out of fear of his
brother doing so. His little brother did love her, but he would not betray Itachi that way.
Unlike Izumi, there was a limit to Sasuke's selfishness.
His father knew him well, but didn't seem to know his brother at all.
"Sasuke did this so that she and I could be together. He wants our happiness.", Itachi said angrily.
He turned to the house then and walked back, signaling the conversation was over
Itachi shook his head as he started the water in the shower. The only two people till now to sacrifice even their pride for him had
been Shisui and his father was ultimately a good man, but it was hard to feel loved by him.
He settled for being understood long ago.
He had been resigned to sharing his life with a dangerous liability, Izumi, before he got close to Sakura.
It had only been a few hours since he had seen her, but he already missed her.
He ran Sakura's words in her letter through his mind again, feeling his soul settle and his chest warm.
She would be there for him too, a companion that didn't make him feel even more alone.
The hot spray reminded him of his last bathing experience, surrounded by Sakura's hot, wet mouth and eager hands.
A wave of desire rolled through him, images of his hands in her beautiful hair, the rapture on her face as he drove into her at
his hideout. She was his now.
Sex was sanctioned, a right for both of them. He could touch her with abandon and without guilt as she allowed.
The Uchiha heir wanted to show her what that would feel like.
Shisui had said they didn't marry, were waiting for spring, but the Hokage had said they married.
Izumi couldn't blame Sakura for spreading her legs sooner than she planned.
Itachi was hot, no doubt about it, and she would have happily fucked him if he'd let her.
This of course meant Sakura was wanted and she wasn't, and despite that making her first plan more possible, it really pissed her off.
All night the nagging thought of just not being good enough drove her to distraction and deprived her of sleep.
She wanted someone to feel as bad as she did right now, namely Sakura.
She marched toward the hospital, conjuring up the few memories she did have of Itachi reacting to her in the past, something to
make her introduction stick. She went through the double doors, walked to the back of the first hall, and spotted a familiar figure.
Itachi didn't look injured. In fact, she knew that look very well on a man, though she had never seen it on him.
It was anticipation of some very adult fun.
The chase.
She kept him in sight as he asked for Sakura's whereabouts from various staff.
Finally, he stopped at a door. One that opened after he knocked, was promptly shut and locked behind him.
Izumi leaned against the wall, waiting.
They would come out sooner or later, then she could introduce herself.
She had a memory or two to punish Itachi with too.
