Okay peeps, this is my first ever POSTED Naruto fic...not to mention the first time I've ever attempted to write Itachi in his true character, not that I think I did it right. Hmm, I have a request though. BEFORE YOU FLAME ME, please read the Author's Note at the end...it might explain a few things for you. Lol.

So anyway, hope you like it. >

"Uchiha Itachi"

I am Uchiha Itachi and to most people, I'm a nightmare.

I'm a figurehead, an archetype used to scare children and genin into a life of obedience and respect for their own strength. Parents or those old enough to remember me whisper my name in the lowest of voices…if they mention me at all. And they are wise in their caution…because I am Uchiha Itachi and I am a monster.

I knew long before I took that final bloody course of action that I was becoming a creature of destruction…I knew and quite frankly, couldn't find it in me to care. I didn't want to be the Uchiha heir, I didn't want that life. I wanted to stretch and branch and push myself to be the strongest…the best…the most powerful. Indeed, I achieved my goal all too easily.

I was an ANBU captain at the age of thirteen; an unheard of feat in those times. I was an elite soldier with many dozens of kills to my name. S-class missions and untold dangers forced my world view to change, not that I hold the illusion that I was ever an innocent child. Far from it, I recognized the drive and determination in myself years before I made ANBU and I knew that I would become powerful. However, I failed to understand one pivotal point. I didn't know I would change in that pursuit for strength; I didn't know what effect it would have on the soul within me or the world around me.

My home life, though unsatisfying and often tense, was the come-down path for me after a mission. I would wash the blood from my skin, clean my weapons and then head home as if I hadn't murdered several men or women in the name Konoha village. I would come home and offer a half smile to my mother and father; they always asked how my missions went but I knew they didn't really want to know details. That was the way of it; they were afraid of me, afraid of the creature I was slowly becoming. A killer, a murderer…more and more an ANBU captain and less their cherished heir and son.

I found only fear and revulsion in their eyes; it angered me that they would spurn me just because I was more powerful than they would like…just because I had become the strongest, the best. Isn't that what Uchihas were meant to be? Isn't that what I was told to strive for? I won't claim that I did it solely for the glory of the clan…I wanted to become stronger…I needed, I wanted, I desired. It was my ultimate goal.

But they didn't want that. They were afraid. In their eyes there was only a thin veneer of love left, tempered overly much by their disgust and anguish.

The only one who looked upon me with kind, loving eyes anymore was the only one too young to know what my position as an ANBU captain entailed. Sasuke was a brilliant child, yes…a prodigy in his own right…but he lacked the detrimental drive to become stronger. I gave that to him in time, made him want to become stronger than me, but at that age…in those years, he wanted nothing more than to be himself and stay at his own level. Foolish, but still…such a brilliant, beautiful child. He was the last purely innocent thing left in my world. He alone looked upon me with such love…and he alone was honestly happy to have me home after every mission.

And so Sasuke was my anchor, the one I came home for. If not for that child, I would have left the Uchiha compound, not to mention Konoha years before. But I wanted to watch my brother grow up, and grow he did. More intelligent, more beautiful…but he was still weak.

Oh yes, if you graded him against Konoha's other children, anyone would say Sasuke was exceptionally stronger…but by Uchiha standards, the boy was a late bloomer. This didn't bother me overly much but it was a source of constant annoyance to our father, that overbearing cretin. But alas, father took to training Sasuke, trying to make him learn techniques that were far too advanced…techniques that I myself wasn't able to learn at his age. He tried to teach the boy and then berated him when he did not accomplish the tasks exceptionally; only depressing and making Sasuke feel like a failure.

I knew some of these techniques were too advanced…even for one of the Uchiha clan. I did not perfect the fireball jutsu until I was eleven years of age; Sasuke managed it at the tender age of eight. And that was the point that I knew; the point where I figured it all out. The plan fell together so perfectly.

My brother was stronger than anyone his age; his chakra control and potential were practically limitless. My father was training him hard, harder than anyone might train a supposedly unimportant, younger son, even if he was of our great and respected clan. No, I knew my father's plan, knew how his mind worked. He would train Sasuke, my sweet innocent brother, to be stronger, quicker and then he would disown me and name Sasuke heir. So simple.

Truly this didn't bother me; I didn't want to be the heir in the first place, but by dint of my birth, I had no choice in the matter. However, it was at this point in time that I felt uncontrollable rage; I openly acknowledge it. Rage that my father, with his calculating and conniving mind, would try to corrupt my beloved, pure brother just so that he might be rid of me. And I knew my father was corrupting Sasuke…knew it for a fact. I saw him whispering nonsense in the boy's ear…telling him that I wasn't loyal to the clan, didn't deserve my name and that I would sooner kill Sasuke than look at him.

My father wasn't wrong on most points, though he had the wrong reasons. I wasn't loyal to the clan but only because I had no desire to rule…but I was proud of my ancestors. What truly upset me were some of my father's more deranged, damaging innuendos; that I would kill Sasuke. Never…never Sasuke. I realized then that I would kill my father…and my mother with him if she stood in the way. Not just because they were changing Sasuke…sweet Sasuke with his innocent smiles, but also because they feared me, their own son and were slowly turning the only person I loved against me. And so they would pay.

And pay they did. Sasuke came back late that fateful day, while I was still in our home. I stood over the corpses of our parents, unemotionally wiping the blood from my weapon. I heard him come in the front door and turned halfway around in the shadowy darkness of the room to watch him enter our parents' quarters. To watch that pale face drain of expression and then flare with unbearable sorrow and sadness. So beautiful, just to watch the play of emotions on his face; to watch those, so like my own brim with the tears that I myself hadn't felt the compulsion to shed anytime in the past few years. Beautiful.

And that was when I turned to him and delivered that by now infamous message. "Foolish brother, if you want to kill me…you must hate me, despise me." And poor little Sasuke, so pure, came to realize in that moment that I had killed our parents…our whole clan. His eyes weren't shinning with carefree joy anymore…now they gazed upon a heartless murdering monster…me, his beloved brother.

And he charged at me, full of volatile anger that exploded from his too-small body. I only narrowed my eyes and threw a single punch to his vulnerable midsection, watching dispassionately as he crumpled over and sank to the floor.

He asked me why, trying to force out the words around the pain, but I was already turning away. My katana was sheathed and wiped clean; my cloak flared around me as I swept away from the defeated little form of my brother. I would see him again. My actions there that night had ensured it. "Become an avenger, little brother. Seek me out when you have eyes like mine…when you're worthy, when you're strong."

Some might think that the slaughter of my entire clan might have been overkill just to ensure my brother's continued need to become stronger; overkill to make sure my brother would seek me out again. But truly, aside from a pure, unadulterated disgust for my fearful kin, there was a darker motive there. I was a monster and I knew it…and I knew I had to be destroyed.

But alas, my Uchiha pride be damned, I would not suffer myself to be beaten by any man, woman or creature…I was to be the best, always. Even in the Academy and as a genin, chuunin and jounin, I never allowed myself to be beaten. It wasn't in me.

But I had to be defeated…I had to be destroyed, lest I become a monster the likes of which the world has never seen…leaving a bloody path through our land as I senselessly slaughtered on a whim. I had to be destroyed…and I had found and chosen the perfect candidate. It would be poetic justice and a cruel irony, but I decided that I would drive my brother, my darling Sasuke to become the best, better than I…and he would be the avenger, the one to finally defeat me. He would be a fitting heir to the Uchiha clan, what was left of it…and he would form a new generation beneath him, one truly worthy of the Uchiha name; one without our father's oppressive, abusive customs.

It often amuses me, while I travel in my allegiance to Akatsuki, to think that Sasuke might one day settle down with some kunoichi of incredible skill and have dozens of children. It brings a semblance of joy to my heart to think of more innocent, little versions of my adorable Sasuke…and of course, the original chasing after them, running at the end of his thread and yelling about the safety rules concerning shuriken.

Laughter, a rare emotion, often comes to me at these times and it's just another one of those miracles that Sasuke brings into my life, even distanced and estranged as we are. It makes me all the more happy, if you could that bittersweet ache happiness, to imagine that my darling brother might name his first born after me. That would be true poetic justice. Unlikely to happen, true, but it's a sustaining thought.

And nowadays, I'm just waiting. Oh, we've had our little run-ins, me and Sasuke. He always gets so heated and rushes me, or tries to attack. Despite my need to be destroyed, I never let him lay his hands upon me…because I know that should he land even one haphazardly placed attack, I'll have no choice but to hit back. Instinct and habit…habits that would lead me to kill my darling brother, my chosen murderer…my avenger. If I ever truly attack him, he would perish at my hands because he, as of yet, lacks the skills to kill me.

Aside from that, I know he's not yet strong enough. He still has much to learn. He still has to train and become stronger. He's not quite ready…yet.

And perhaps it's my own sick fascination. I say he's not ready, but I'm not ready for him to be ready, either. I enjoy watching him grow and experience life and tragedy and joy. I enjoy watching him learn and prosper and train harder. I look forward to the day that I face him in actual combat and we trade blows as we're meant to. As a murderer and the avenger should. As brothers should.

I wander aimlessly, working for Akatsuki and waiting. Sasuke will come to me eventually, if not to destroy me, then to learn all he can from me and then kill me. Calculating and cunning. He's cute and devious that way.

And so I wait.

Because I am Uchiha Itachi, murderer… and beloved brother of Sasuke, the avenger.

Because I am Uchiha Itachi…and I am a monster.

… The End …

Author'sNote: So what did you think? It's my first Itachi fic...he's so damned hard to write in his true character because we don't really know alot about how he thinks. Lol. Um, okay some important notes before you flame me to death.

-I wrote this before I saw the episodes with the killings of the Uchiha clan, so if something is out of sequence or misquoted or not even mentioned (such as the sharing of the visions) then I'm totally sorry. Try not to be too harsh on me, okay?

-Second...I love, absolutely LOVE Itachi/Sasuke relationships, in any context...romantic, Uchihacest or not. I could care less. I just love their chemistry. So if this sickens you, I'm once again, very sorry...but not quite as sorry as before. Lol.

Otherwise, hope you liked it. Please R&R. Much love,

-Erena G.T. Rose.