The graves of his clan shared a lone tombstone in the shadow of which he was standing. Upon it, at first glance, only the Uchiha crest stood out. Then, underneath it, the patient eye could discern a thousand names painstakingly etched, some of which were hardly legible anymore.
The last 89 had been all added in one go. Sasuke heard it had taken the mason an entire day to carve them.
They had lived together. They had died together. And so, they had been buried together. Well, technically, only 88 bodies, because Shisui's had never been found. But the rest of them had been burned, following the Uchiha customs, their ashes scattered in one common hole dug in the middle of their ancestral graveyard.
Even after all this time, Sasuke would sometimes wonder why he wasn't in there, with them. Surely it would have been a kinder fate than to walk alone, the last of his bloodline. And for what? He never did learn. A senseless tragedy they called it, fingers eager to point at the clan's many enemies outside of Konoha, where the slightest chance of coming across an Uchiha in battle made some turn tail. None of those enemies had ever claimed the honor of having wiped them out, however.
Lucky, the villagers called Sasuke. Lucky for not having been there when his parents, brother, aunts, and uncles and cousins were being slaughtered in the night like animals, murdered in their sleep.
Lucky. He turned that word in his mind like something sharp as his fingertips brushed over the names. Fugaku. Mikoto. Itachi.
I miss you the most.
And the word cut him like it always did, drawing blood. Lucky to be alive when everyone he had ever loved was dead. Sure, fucking lucky.
The gravestone was cold to the touch. Unyielding. His hand dropped at his side, numb, just like the rest of him. Sasuke dipped his head in silent prayer.
Tomorrow I'll be taking the chuunin exam. I promise I'll make you proud.