ONESHOT REQUEST: Hikari and Itachi, Vaporshipping
For Tsukiyomi-Hio: The courtship of Uchiha Itachi and Uzumaki Hikari. In which Hikari never became friends with Fumiko, the Massacre never happened, and the only Uchiha she really knows is Sasuke, but she still gets along with Takahiro.
-O-O-O-O-
Clans, Itachi decides, are a pain in the neck.
His current predicament with the clan does not involve another coup (like the one that they thankfully decided to not go through with when he was thirteen and Sasuke was eight), but that does not mean that it is any less painful. Because the topic that the clan is now harping on about is marriage.
Ever since Fumiko decided that her true love was a civilian outside of the clan, the clan has been pressuring Itachi to find a suitable replacement. They publicized his status as an eligible bachelor— he scoffs in a very Sasuke-like fashion, imagining how they would do so: Check out Uchiha Itachi while you're passing by. He's twenty-five, capable, and rich— and set up meetings with kunoichi from other clans.
The one good thing about this is that he is allowed to let his personality show, where in the past, he was instructed to show as much personality as a doorknob in order to hide weakness.
He spots a flash of red from the corner of his eye and turns to see his brother's team sparring against the Uzumaki girl. Well, not so much of a girl anymore. He eyes her critically, finding no flaws in her movements— except perhaps for the unnecessary finger flick she gives her twin— and her appearance is decent. Now that he thinks about it, she's from a clan. She's strong. She's moderately pretty. And she gets along well with Sasuke.
She'll do.
-O-O-O-O-
She blinks at him, confused. It's rather endearing, he observes. But she does have a good reason to be confused, because he's approached her for the first time.
"Itachi-san?" she asks, uncertain.
"Hikari-san," he returns smoothly. "Would you like to spar with me?"
His offer takes her off guard. She is bewildered, he notices, and is unsure of how to respond. After all, why would he, an elite shinobi who graduated even earlier than she did, want anything to do with her, a new jounin?
"I would like that," she finally responds, "but I don't know if you'll gain much from it."
"I have not had the opportunity to fight someone with your skill set," he says. "I'm sure I will learn many things."
They set the date and he smiles with satisfaction, pleased with himself.
After dinner, Sasuke storms up to him, demanding answers.
"Seriously, Aniki? She's my best friend! You could have chosen any girl in the village and you choose her, of all people?"
"First of all, Otouto, I can't have just any girl in the village. The clan has set certain requirements for my wife, and she happens to fulfill them easily. Secondly, I doubt I would be able to choose from all of the village's girls. Your friend, Naruto, would surely protest if I attempted to court the Hyuuga heiress," he says.
"Why her? Besides the requirements. Did she just happen to be the first girl you saw who passed?" his silly little brother asks, frustrated.
"She's fascinating," he admits. "Besides, since she's your best friend, wouldn't it be nice if she were family?"
-O-O-O-O-
When they meet at a training field, she avoids his eyes. He sighs lightly.
"Sasuke has told you, then?"
Her lips thin into a pressed line. "Itachi-san, what were you expecting to achieve? That you'd ease yourself into my life and I'd find myself falling in love with you?"
He pauses, surprised that she's managed to pinpoint him so well. "Something like that, yes."
She rolls her eyes. "These things take time, you know? You have to get to know someone and be friends first, so if you're going to do this, you're going to do this correctly."
She's managed to surprise him again. "So you're willing to entertain it?"
"Only if you do it properly. Since the first step is to become friends, let's drop the suffixes. I'll call you Itachi, and you can call me Hikari."
He agrees, and they spar. She's good, almost too good, and he thinks that she should have been promoted much earlier. He tells her.
She's pleased.
-O-O-O-O-
They settle into an easygoing relationship. They train, pointing out each others' weaknesses (however few they may be). She teases him, and he teases her back. They discuss politics, ridicule his brother, and spend their time pleasantly. And every day, he asks her if she's fallen in love with him yet, to which she rolls her eyes and smiles while saying no.
One day, while they're eating enough dango to put Anko to shame, she suddenly pipes up with a suggestion. "Let's go to the harvest festival," she says. "Full festival dress. Pick me up at seven."
He raises an eyebrow. "As dates?"
She shrugs a shoulder, nonchalant and smiling. "Sure, why not?"
He allows himself a smirk.
That evening, he heads out to pick her up, decked in a black yukata with Sharingan red accents. When she opens the door, she rolls her eyes at his choice of colors, but he is too busy admiring how her pale orange yukata, which fades to the orange of a sunset, complements her skin. Her hair is pulled up into a bun, kept in place by a hairpiece bejeweled with crystal flowers.
He offers her his arm. She takes it.
The festival is filled with a lighthearted joy that he's come to associate with her. The festival lights shine around her, persuading her face to glow with an almost ethereal light. And this is when Itachi realizes that he's fallen for her.
The realization stirs a strange feeling within him. How was it that she, a girl he had merely been pursuing for the sake of the clan on the basis of having fulfilled the requirements, wormed her way into his life and heart, much like he'd been planning on doing to her? It's a bit ironic, he muses as he watches her laugh while attempting to scoop a goldfish up with a special paper net designed to challenge shinobi.
She glances up at him, beckoning him to try. He catches a goldfish on his first try and gives it to her to keep.
"I'm going to name it Amaterasu," she announces. "After your jutsu."
He's flattered, and he tells her so. She responds just like he anticipates.
"Well, I didn't choose it to flatter you. I chose it because she'll grow to be strong, like your jutsu."
"I caught her for you. Do you love me yet?" The words cause his insides to warm for the first time.
And as always, she rolls her eyes, smiles, and says no.
-O-O-O-O-
Amaterasu dies the next day.
It's a bit unfortunate, but they flush her down the toilet with little fanfare. Hikari isn't very upset, just regretful that her money was wasted on catching a fish that died the next day.
"I can buy you another one," he offers, but she declines, stating that she doesn't know if she has time for a pet.
"Besides," she says, "if I do get a pet, I want something I can cuddle, preferably a dog or a cat. Not a nin-dog or nin-cat though. Just an ordinary, domesticated, fluffy animal."
So of course, the next time they meet, he presents her with a tiny white puppy that has a brown spot over its eye, paws, and tails. It reduces her to coos.
"Thanks," she beams. He decides that he very much likes her smile.
"It wasn't a problem." They spend the rest of the day playing with the newly named Shiromaru.
-O-O-O-O-
He finds himself missing her when she leaves for a mission, an S-Rank. She told him not to worry, but he can't help it if he does.
He loves her.
And it is completely normal to worry about the person he loves, because she's on an S-Rank mission tracking down a missing-nin notorious for immortality, of all things.
He wonders why he hasn't been chosen for the mission, but he realizes that her team, which specializes in these sorts of missions, is a better fit and works better without an added fourth person.
So he spends his time worrying and yearning to see her again. Sasuke calls it moping, but Itachi disagrees.
He's merely worrying. Uchiha don't mope.
Her brother visits him while she's gone. Uzumaki Naruto is loud, opinionated, and everything that a shinobi shouldn't be, but he is her brother and he makes it very clear that if Itachi ever ends up hurting or playing her, he will hunt him down, break his fingers (one at a time), pull off his fingernails, rip out his organs, burn his hair, slice his legs into ribbons, and unleash the Kyuubi so that he can die a painful death encased in the poisonous chakra of the Kyuubi.
Itachi reassures him that he is in love with Hikari and is a complete fool for her.
He's waiting for her at the gates when they return. It is chaos, because her teammate, the medic, has been severely injured and no one else was qualified enough to treat him beyond mediocre healing. They rush him to the hospital, and Itachi trails after them because Hikari was in charge of the mission and she's definitely blaming herself.
He finds her in the waiting room, sitting with her face in her hands. He sits himself next to her, carefully drawing her into his arms. She shakes with silent sobs, but he soothes her with murmurs of nonsensical things, the antics Shiromaru got up to when she was gone, how Sasuke woke up one day to find his hair in pigtails courtesy of Naruto, little things that take her mind off of the medic fighting for his life on the operation table.
Three hours later, they receive news that he will survive.
She's relieved, and bursts out into tears once more, openly sobbing into his shoulder. He listens to the medic who brought the news, rubbing her shoulders while he learns that her teammate will have to undergo physical therapy for at least half of a year before he is fit for duty, but she doesn't care and he doesn't care because her teammate is going to live.
She calms down and the medic leaves. Itachi turns to her, schooling his features into the most serious face he can muster.
"Hikari." He succeeds in getting her attention.
"Do you love me yet?"
She stares at him in disbelief, unable to cope with the fact that he is actually joking to try and ease her mind, and begins to laugh, softly at first, then loudly, clear and true.
But.
Her answer is different this time.
"You idiot," she says fondly, reaching up to place a small hand against his cheek. "I fell in love with you ages ago."
-O-O-O-O-
A/N: Well, here it is, Tsukiyomi-Hio!
This one was actually really hard to write, because I'm not done developing Itachi's character and personality in Reaching!Naruto. I'm happy with how it turned out, however!
Remember that requests are always open! Just leave a review of what you'd like to see written next, be in a pairing, a nonpairing, an AU, a scenario, etc.
See you next time!