family affair

fifteen:

(un)tethered

The next morning, they snuck out of Hinata's bedroom like teenagers.

Hinata took the lead, guiding Sasuke down the back stairway in the early hours of the day, and taking him to the garage where she unlocked the door to her G Wagon. She knew the guards' schedules around the house almost better than her father did.

"Be right back," she said, then turned around and disappeared back into her home.

Sasuke rubbed the sleep out of his eyes; the night of mourning, drinking, and fucking was a whirlwind inside his brain. He was being fucked up and he was fucked up. Many bad decisions were made in the last 24 hours––starting with his rendezvous with the former Uchiha Compound.

Casual sex usually did not turn out this way for him. He usually eased out of bed once they finished and drove himself home. Maybe he'd even stop and get some fast food on the way. He never...stayed. He never agreed to do activities the next day.

Even if activities were illicit ones. He reminded himself of that: this activity was an illicit activity, and therefore he was allowed to continue to hang out with the Hyuga. It was intel. He'd never been on a solo run with her before.

"Alright, thanks for w-waiting," Hinata swung her body into the driver's seat, buckling her seatbelt over her body. When they woke up the second time, she rushed into her bathroom to change into some modern black bell bottoms and a turtleneck. At the garage, she shrugged on a short black puffer coat. Wryly, Sasuke had asked, "Do I need to wear black for this?"

"No," Hinata answered. "We won't stick out where we're going."

In the car, Hinata casually punched the radio, letting smooth jazz fill the vehicle. As she began to pull out, she looked at him. "Y-you don't have to come with, you k-know? Last night––"

"I don't have to do anything," Sasuke said, cutting her off. "But I said I would because I wanted to."

"Okay," Hinata said. "W-well, thanks. Usually, Neji covers me for this, but he's been busy with...everything."

They fell into silence. Hinata drove out of the Estate gates and found the expressway quickly. Her driving was smooth and careful–– but fast. She was well taught in this skill, too. Sasuke watched her lean back casually and confidently in the driver's seat. Her hair was pulled back from her face, and for once, she looked at peace.

Sasuke decided to ruin it: he leaned back too, lifting the corner of his mouth into a smirk as he asked her: "So, do you want to talk about last night?"

Hinata blanched, but the car remained on its straight path. Her face colored considerably, "W-what do you want to talk about?"

"Well, did you enjoy yourself?"

Hinata coughed, her eyes hard on the twisting expressway. Her hands turned the wheel slightly to accommodate. She cleared her throat, "Um, y-yes. I think I did. D-did you?"

"I did," Sasuke confirmed, and it was true. Her body was warm and soft under his fingertips, nothing like the hard lines of the agents he usually went for. Agents were the safest options. Civilians were fine too sometimes, but they were too curious, always wanting more. And on missions, he usually only went for the malleable type if it benefitted the case, and those women were always the wildcard.

Hinata, though, was different. He didn't know why or how––just that she was different. It wasn't unusual for him to be attracted to a woman during a mission, but it was that he felt the attraction so intensely. Every time he looked at her, fire raced through his body. He remembered how she smelled, how she sounded, the way she gripped his shoulders.

But he kept all that to himself and looked out the window. Hinata merged to an exit.

"M-maybe..." She pulled the car to a stop at the red light. "Maybe we can do it again?"

Her face was bright red, and the set of it was somewhat entertaining, but the thought of fucking her again made Sasuke forget the teasing. Instead, he made eye contact with her and said "I wouldn't be mad at that."

Hinata cleared her throat again. She made a couple more quick turns before she released a long breath and said, "Okay! We're here."

They were both somewhat hot when they exited the car, but the cold was a reminder of the circumstances. Sasuke looked at the sign above them that read in giant purple letters: YAMANAKA FLOWERS. A man was standing beside the entrance, smoking, and Sasuke watched Hinata nod to him as they walked through the entrance.

"You buyin' me flowers, Hyuga?" He asked dryly. "I knew it was good but––"

Hinata elbowed him hard in the side. It probably would've hurt more if it weren't for his own winter jacket. They shuffled into the front door, and Sasuke jostled her side in retaliation so Hinata pushed him until they were expelling tiny laughters from their open mouths.

"You two are in a good mood," a voice called from somewhere among the large and affronting fauna. Sasuke felt pissed just by the size of some of the plants.

"Morning, Ino," Hinata called to the blonde, who materialized wearing an apron and carrying a bag of dirt.

Sasuke had never seen her do manual labor before, so her ensemble seemed a bit ridiculous. He said as much: "I've never seen you do work."

The statement had the desired effect. Ino wrinkled her nose in irritation and her attention shifted from their giggling faces to Sasuke's unceremonious appearance at her store. "What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"

Sasuke shrugged. Hinata distracted herself by digging keys out of the bottom of her tote bag. Keys and..some tools, which she then asked Sasuke to hold.

"It was merely an observation," he said, grabbing the screwdriver and other various metal parts. Hinata began to walk ahead of him and he followed, though an angry Ino was hot on their tail, steam blowing from her ears.

"I'll have you know that I practically run this place! Do you know how many motherfucking flowers I grow in the span of a week?"

In front of him, Hinata moved a few plants out of the way of a door that looked like it led to a storage closet. She glanced at a clipboard and marked something off with a pen. When Sasuke followed her inside the room, he glanced at the clipboard. It was shipment information for radishes.

Cocaine probably, he mused, as he slipped past the door. Hinata had stopped short, and so her backside rubbed against him and they jolted apart like two opposite magnets. Ino forced her way in, swinging the door all the way so that it hit the wall with a hard smack.

"Does that mean nothing to you, Uchiha? When have you ever given something life, you––"

"Ino," Hinata's voice said softly as she squatted before a safe Sasuke hadn't noticed before. There were magazines and a pair of pink gloves on top of it. "You know the rules. Please?"

"Fine," Ino said, unhappily. She crossed her arms over her chest as she glared at Sasuke. "He just pissed me off. Like, misogynistic––you know?"

"Sure," Hinata said. "C'mon, I don't have m-much time today."

Ino huffed and left the room, closing the door with an irritated thud. Hinata clicked her tongue at her exit, frowning. Her jeans stretched down and exposed the small of her back, where the dark lines of her tattoo twisted across her torso and crawled down her body.

"Why'd you have to say that to her?"

Sasuke tore his gaze away to meet her eyes. The safe clicked open easily under her palm, and she looked away. She made quick work of jostling some things that made clinking sounds––store banks probably––before she pulled out a key. She put the key in her pocket and replaced it with a new one. Then she closed the safe, twirled the combination, and stood up.

"We done?"

"Nope," she said.

"Cool," Sasuke said. "I apologize if I was too harsh. Ino is very observant, and I wanted to distract her so she wouldn't focus on us. On you, mostly."

"But I wasn't being weird," Hinata led him through yet another door, which led him to a courtyard where rows of empty pots and mounds of fertilizer lay in the path of the frosted winter sun. Sasuke imagined that in the spring, the whole place was taken up by planters with sprouting greenery.

"No, you weren't," Sasuke agreed. "Not really, anyway. But..I don't think you've looked in a mirror."

She opened the camera on her phone and her mouth widened at the sight. Sasuke had left a sizable hickey on the left side of her neck. It wasn't his best work. It was probablyhis worst work, actually. It was a rule, as a spy, to never leave evidence. But he knew better than anyone else that he hadn't been acting as a spy last night.

And that was the hardest thing to contend with. He'd been irresponsible. Worse––he'd been messy. Distracting Ino was more for him than Hinata, but he figured both would be beneficial in the long run.

Hinata swore under her breath. "You should've told me before we left the h-house!"

"You act like I can see in the dark. I didn't notice until we were under the fluorescents inside."

Hinata said nothing as she walked across the courtyard, idly yanking up the fabric of her turtleneck. There were three greenhouses in front of them, and she chose the one all the way right. She entered a code into the keypad, different from the other doors, Sasuke observed, and gestured him through. The smell of weed hit him like a punch to the throat.

"Harvest is coming up," Hinata said as she buried her nose into a dense bundle of marijuana. "My mom was friends with Ino's mom. They would sit for hours in the courtyard, cutting the buds from the stems."

"Did they get to smoke it?"

"Of course," Hinata said. Miraculously, there was yet another door. Hinata unlocked the door with the key she had gotten from the safe. Then, she knelt in front of it. "Can you hand me that s-screwdriver?"

Astonished, Sasuke handed it to her, and she began to dismantle the lock. Within minutes, she had replaced it entirely, throwing the old turnplate into her tote bag. Once that was done, Sasuke helped her up and they entered the room, locking the door behind them.

There was an even bigger safe in here. Hinata dove into her tote bag once more and pulled out a pair of nitrile gloves. She turned the combination, blocking it with her body until a loud click erupted in the silence of the room. Sasuke watched her move a couple of bricks of cocaine, internally congratulating himself on the guess that "radishes" indeed meant coke.

There was a stack of yen which she quickly counted, rubber-banded, and tossed into her magical tote bag. Then she paused, reached under her shirt, and pulled out a white flashdrive.

Sasuke's heart practically lept from his chest at the sight of it. It was the thing he had been sent there for. It was the key to finishing this god-forsaken mission. It was the Byakugan file: the key to the city. His mission. His goal. He could turn it in, go home, and finally get the revenge on the Hyugas he'd always wanted.

A thousand scenarios flashed through his mind in that second. He could knock Hinata unconscious, kill her right there even, grab the file and head straight to headquarters. It would probably take minimal effort to lie to Ino about his hasty departure. Even less effort to disable her from acting, too. He could go straight to the headquarters downtown if he wanted, and be there in 15 minutes driving Hinata's G-Wagon 100 miles an hour. He wondered how fast it could go and then estimated how quickly he'd get there at that speed once he picked a starting point.

He probably didn't even have to go through the flower shop. He should jump the gate, wire a car, and be at headquarters without telling a single soul.

He could drive Hinata home, leave her unsuspecting, and re-trace her steps until he got to this safe. He could ask Sakura for some technology that will help him find the safe combination and take the file in the middle of the night.

He would stop dreaming about the gunshots at the Uchiha Compound every night. He could stop seeing Hyuga Hizashi walk casually across their back deck, sipping liquor with his father. The Hyugas deserved to burn just like his family had. They deserved to––

Hinata slid the flash drive into the safe, patting it like it was an old friend. She shut the safe with a tired turn of the knob, then pretended to wipe the sweat off her brow.

"I'm exhausted," she said, smiling shyly up at him. "Thanks for g-going on this run with me. Coffee on me?"

And then he said yes. Of course.

It's not time yet, he reasoned with himself. I know where it is now, in any case. Besides, I still have to talk to Itachi.

And so he left the file in the safe, instead of in his pockets, where it belonged.

-:-

When Gaara pulled up in his Jaguar, Hinata forced her discomfort back down her throat. There would be time enough for that later.

She got into his car without saying a word, shuffling her dress over her ankles, and depositing her heel-enclosed feet carefully onto the floor of the car. She was wearing a long, satin, dress with tiny shoulder straps the color of eggplant. Her shoes were basic black heels, and she had a classic, Hyuga fur coat draped over her arms. Earlier that day she had gotten a message from Gaara saying that attire was black-tie.

"Hello to you, too," Gaara grunted as he pulled away from the Estate. Hinata watched her home get smaller in her rear-view mirror. "As I hope you've been informed already, this isn't the big meeting. We're just testing the waters. Fortunately, you look the part-hopefully, you can act right."

Hinata held in a scoff. It wouldn't help her in this situation. What of his acting? What of his behavior? Hinata tugged her dress down in the back, rubbing the spot where she had hidden a flat knife at her thigh. "So, who are we meeting tonight?"

"My immediate family, mostly. It's a closed meeting with weapons traders from Korea. They want to make sure that my claim is accurate before the Boys Club Meeting."

"And w-what claim is that?"

Their eyes met as Gaara pumped the gas, "That we are in a loving relationship. That the Hyugas have a great stake in Suna's business decisions. Unfortunately, your name alone is its own power. You probably know nothing about that."

Already, Hinata wanted to stab him. Maybe she would.

-:-

The supermarket was crowded for a normal Friday. Crowded, even, for a rural seaside town like Kumozuhongocho. Sasuke had driven four hours from Konoha just to get there. Now he glanced at the blue and pink Keiko's Fresh Market sign in blank curiosity. It featured an illustration of a smiling girl holding a small red fish. He'd never heard of it before, but apparently, seafood was half-priced or buy-one-get-one-free on Fridays.

When he walked in, a congested teenager in a pink apron greeted him with a small wave, saying "Welcome to Free Fish Fridays. Can I help you find something?"

Sasuke told him he was looking for imitation crab, which apparently did not fall under the umbrella of Friday Fish Deals. He browsed the aisles, carefully avoiding elderly women leaning on their full carts, and children who had run too far away from their parents in search of the candy section. In aisle 5 he located the bagged crab and he took it from the freezer.

He held the cold bag in his hands, remembering how on chilly days, his mother would ladle oil into a pan in the kitchen while Sasuke carefully folded wonton around the crab, cream cheese, and whatever else the two of them had conspired up. His mother loved cooking, loved trying new things, and her crab rangoon concoctions were one of her guilty pleasures. She often called it a cheap and silly snack.

Sasuke had let his guard down. Someone snatched the bag from his hands and Sasuke immediately dropped into a defense position, throwing his arms in front of his body like a biting snake. The offending person stepped aside, chucking as he dropped the crab into his cart. It was full of things for dinner: a whole fish, green onions, mixed vegetables, rice, and various seasonings and sauces. An ice bag on the bottom rack began to leak on the wheels. A pack of beers sweated profusely.

"Little brother," the person said, watching Sasuke who did not move from his position. He smiled, "I knew you would come."

Uchiha Itachi stood next to him, 13 years older, but otherwise almost entirely the same. His hair was longer but still tied back behind his head. He still had long eyelashes and a severe jaw. And he looked harmless in civilian clothes, just a brown wool sweater, and green jogging pants.

"Come," he said casually as if it hadn't been 13 years since they'd last seen each other. As if Itachi wasn't in a mercenary group that had almost killed Sasuke two years ago. As if there was not an entire bloodline of dead family members spread between them. "I'm making dinner."

Sasuke said okay.

-:-

Gaara had his hand on her waist. It felt familiar and alarming all at once. Together, they entered a private dining club that was made up of dark mahogany, velvet walls, and giant haunting paintings of old men. The frames were gaudy and gold, glistening against the candle-lit tables.

The dining club was quietly made up of men in suits and women in formal gowns, all sitting at pearl-white table settings and whispering amongst themselves as if they enjoyed telling each other very private things in a partially-public place. Gaara nodded in greeting to a few very endowed-looking men, whose wrists shine with wealth. When he knew they hadn't quite yet looked away, he kissed her cheek.

The waitstaff practically refused to look any of them in the eye. The host led them to the bar, where Temari and Kankuro waited with flashing eyes. Kankuro looked like he wanted to devour her right there. Gaara tightened his grip, squishing Hinata against his body...and she smiled.

"Kankuro-san, Temari-san, so l-lovely to see you again. It's been t-too long..." She felt her voice fade as their expressions were unmoved.

"Slut," Temari said, turning her back on her. Her blonde puffs were adorned with what looked like diamonds that glinted against the candlelight. She was wearing a floor-length, deep orange gown that wrapped around her middle and exposed one shoulder. Her nails were long, pointy, and matched that same dangerous color. She took a sip of wine and didn't turn back.

To her credit, Hinata was unphased. Temari had never liked her; though, calling her a "slut" seemed uncalled for, considering it was Gaara who had requested her presence.

"Play nice, now sister," Kankuro said, his voice big in the small space. His suit was clean and dark but somewhat wrinkled around the waist as if it had been hastily put on. "It's impolite to use such language around such beautiful company."

"and with great pedigree," Gaara said. His hand traveled lower, his ringed fingers roughly pressing through the fabric, and Hinata stepped away idly. She picked up the drink menu and reminded herself that she was here for her family. The Syndicate was in trouble. This was one way to fix it, even if the siblings were standing in a circle, speaking as if she were a show dog.

"I'll have scotch," Hinata said to the bartender, and suddenly remembered the night and morning she'd spent with Uchiha Sasuke. "S-straight, please. No ice."

She sipped it as the siblings talked. Gaara pulled her to his side roughly, his hand an iron weight around her waist. His fingers tapped against her dress mildly. It was stressful to be so close to him, but not difficult. His touches felt familiar, even if they were rough. She remembered being a teenager and being so lost in love with him it hurt. If her teenage self could see them interacting in this way together, in public, she would've rejoiced. She would've cried. Teenage Hinata did not think such a union would be possible.

But this teenage Hinata did not yet know the troubles that would fall between them, and it broke Hinata's heart. It broke Hinata's heart to think of them.

After some time passed, a waiter led them to their private dining room, where they sat at a round table. Gaara pulled her chair so close that she was practically in his lap like he wanted it. The sibling continued to talk as if she weren't there, boisterously telling stories about the day they had all had. Hinata briefly considered telling her father about her treatment at this place, but she quickly banished the thought from her mind. Her father wouldn't make her do this if their alliance with Suna wasn't necessary. Even Shikaku had thought this was the best course of action. Few could argue with Shikaku. Their other allies were few and far between in the face of this new threat.

"Sorry I'm late," a deep voice rang through. A man with orange hair entered the room behind a waiter who gestured him forward. "Traffic. My associate couldn't be here either, but she sends her regards."

"No worries," Gaara said while he put his hand on Hinata's knee under the table. She tried not to move. Instead, she smiled at him, then at their new guest. "I'm glad you made it, Jugo."

Jugo took the only empty seat across from Gaara. He leaned forward, inspecting Hinata from head to toe, and their eyes made electric contact. He was sizing her up off the bat! Hinata would have turned red if she wasn't so shocked by how brash this was. "Well damn," he said. "You really are a Hyuga. That shit's crazy."

Hinata simply smiled. She brought her hand to rest on top of Gaara's and said, "Excuse me? W-what's crazy about that?" She looked at Gaara, her brows creasing, "We...w-we love each other."

She thought for a moment she was laying it on a little too thick, but Gaara just squeezed her thigh under the table and looked at her, his green eyes swirling with something she could not discern. The "love" tattoo on his perfect forehead mocked her. She wanted to put two fingers against it, and shove hard.

"Like Romeo and Juliet," Temari said dryly as she tore into a piece of bread. "Except no one has died."

Yet. The threat hung loosely in the air. Hinata threaded her fingers through Gaara's and squeezed. He took his hand from her thigh and slung it across the back of her chair. They probably looked like the perfect couple: her in her satin dress, him in his dark suit, smiling at their new business partner. All she needed was a ring.

"It's n-not like that at all," Hinata sent Temari a pointed look that probably came off as more timid than brave to the stranger. "My father approves of Gaara. He's no idiot, h-he saw the strengths in such a union in this climate."

"And your father is Hyuga Hiashi?" Jugo looked to her for confirmation.

"I'd be a fool to lie about that," Hinata said.

"Hmph," Jugo said appreciatively. He nodded, then he turned 100% of his energy towards Gaara. "For fucks sake, combined y'all will run Konoha and this entire country. This is some good damn breeding. I'm in. At the Boys Club next month? I've got your back. After that, too. Shit."

Garra smiled thinly, raising his glass of cognac. "Excellent. It's a deal then. Dropship the rifles before that and you won't have to question our support again."

"Hyuga's included," Hinata said, jutting her chin forward. "We thank you for your support."

Gaara shook Jugo's hand, and Hinata stuck hers out too. Suddenly, she and her ex-boyfriend were a power couple, and she couldn't wait to go fucking home.

-:-

After Itachi checked out at the grocery store-ruefully, casually, as if nothing was wrong-they walked for several miles along the coast. The water was not frozen, but it was frigid and the wind was stiff and unrelenting. Sasuke clenched his teeth and told himself to be grateful that there was no ice. Itachi whistled casually beside him. They were carrying two bags each.

Soon, they were quite far away from the town center. They walked past frozen fields that had signs advertising radishes (actual radishes this time, Sasuke noted idly), and tiny homes that looked seconds away from sinking into the ground. The sky was gray and covered in great clouds, the sun just a suggestion behind its thick cover.

Finally, Itachi turned on a dock. There was only one boat there. He dropped his bags and began to undress without a word, pulling his coat off, then his sweater, and finally his T-shirt underneath. His skin was pale and familiar.

Sasuke understood. He dropped his bags too and did the same until they were both standing freezing in their underwear, pretending to be unbothered by the cold. "No wire," Sasuke said. "I've got no phone either. I'm tech free."

Itachi didn't appear to be wearing anything either. He nodded and put his clothes back on. When he pulled his joggers back on, Sasuke saw the Uchiha fan tattoo on his ankle and felt strange nostalgic comfort at the sight of it. He hadn't gotten it covered or removed.

They grabbed the bags and boarded the only boat that was docked there, a small houseboat with chipped yellow paint and a statue of a serpent woman at its bowsprit. Itachi led him to an even smaller kitchen and started, without preamble, slicing up the fish. The boat rocked unsteadily. There was a tiny couch at the entrance and a doorway past the small stove. A bedroom, perhaps.

"Dice up some garlic for me?"

Sasuke let his annoyance settle into the pit of his stomach. There was a basket full of garlic and he grabbed a head. A wooden cutting board was on the counter, and Itachi handed him a knife. He looked at him out of the corner of his eye, "Do you live here or something?"

"Sometimes," Itachi said, unaffected. "I live many places."

"Hm," Sasuke said, dicing away. Itachi was silent beside him and began sprinkling seasoning over the pink flesh of the fish. Sasuke cut a lemon from the basket in half, and handed it to him. Itachi nodded and squeezed it over the seafood.

They were standing stiffly. This was how they would cook at home with their mother, each dutifully handling a step in the process, handing the other something they thought might taste good. The easy fall into such a routine felt overwhelming. There was too much to say at once; an ocean between them, and yet they were on a boat, aromas of food sifting between them like they were about to eat dinner against a sunset and talk about their vacation plans.

"Why did you tell me to come?"

"You have questions you want to ask me, Outoto. And not just about how I've been living," Itachi slowly rolled up the sleeves of his sweater, exposing muscled and scarred forearms. "At present, I don't think relationship building is on the agenda for tonight, but I figured a good meal would be a worthwhile cover story. When I left scratched yen on the bar table, I wasn't sure you would remember what it meant."

"It was a test?"

"Most things are tests. If you failed it would mean you had forgotten your roots, and this conversation would be a pointless one. But you passed, and I see it is ANBU who has failed to make a good subservient agent out of you."

Sasuke bristled at this, feeling the hair rise on the back of his neck. Itachi collected the garlic as if nothing was happening, throwing it into a hot pan sizzling with a tablespoon's worth of butter. He plucked leaves off of dill growing at the windowsill, throwing it into the pot too. He must have been living in the boat for a while, at least a couple of weeks, to maintain the fresh dill. Sasuke could feel the heat from the pan on his skin.

"So what?" He asked, tone low, dangerous. It was true that they had told student agents to forget everything from their past during his training, even going as far as drilling it out of them using numerous psych evals and mental exercises. But Sasuke was an Uchiha first. He'd buried the memories, sure-they were painful ones after all-but they didn't disappear.

Naruto couldn't remember a damn thing about the time before agents had found him in high school. Sakura only had memories of an aunt who had taken care of her after her parents' car accident, and she barely even remembered that. It wasn't that their lives started at ANBU, it was that they had all chosen to forget the past.

"Think about what it means to train young men and women, who are estranged from their families in one way or another, in espionage. Think of what it means to have them untether themselves from where they came from. They lose who they are. They lose who their ancestors are."

"Sure," Sasuke said. "Again––so what?"

"Little brother you have always been brash," Itachi said. "But you are no idiot. You know how important the ancestors are, and so you have not made yourself forget. In any case...you now eat with the Hyugas as you work toward their downfall. Why?"

Sasuke turned abruptly, his lips curling, "It's classified, Itachi. You know that."

"You wouldn't be here if there was no reason for doubt," Itachi gently placed a lid over the fish. He turned and leaned against the small counter. He and Sasuke were toe-to-toe in the small aisle of the kitchen. The sun emerged from its cloudy hideaway, sending meager rays into this small kitchen, making Itachi's gaze sharp and divine. "And I can tell you have doubts, little brother. You haven't changed, and you would not have come if you didn't need anything. Let me know if I'm wrong. If I am, I'm happy to see you back to the town center."

Sasuke gritted his teeth, his fists curling at his sides. It seemed that Itachi was still fond of making him feel little with his words, making him question his actions, and turning his words around in his mouth. But it was true-he had come with questions. All of the weeks' madness swirled into too many questions. "You're not––wrong."

Itachi nodded. "I didn't think I was. Let me ask you something else, do you know who the head of ANBU is?"

Sasuke breathed heavily through his nose, feeling a cluster headache assault his senses, "No one does, not really. I only know my superiors masked, and most of them only know me that way."

There was a beat of silence.

Something in Itachi's face slipped, and sadness clouded his gaze before he looked away. "Little brother, you have compromised so much for the idea of stability. You were young and guardian-less, and part of that is my fault, but now you must know the truth. ANBU killed our family. ANBU raided the compound that day. For years, they didn't know either of us had survived, but when you showed up on a high school roster one day, they knew they had to fold you into the agency and mold you into whatever they wanted."

Sasuke did not breathe, but he did think about walking away, getting into his car, and driving into a bridge. He heard the crunch of the metal, felt his body collapsing inside the car, and gladly surrendered to fate.

In the small of his brother's houseboat, he sat on the couch and looked at Itachi expectantly. "Tell me everything you know. Now."