Note to Readers: This time around you get a snippet of Sasuke's ethos. I think I might try weekly updates for this, at least until it gets overwhelming.
Joli Etoile: Thanks for following me into my new work. Oh Monster, what an experience that was. Sasuke is most definitely prideful, but in this timeline he is not a trained killer so I don't think he'd have as much a problem with it. I explore his mindset regarding Itachi in this chapter, so I hope it clears it up a bit.
The Tattoo
T(ruth) W(ills) O(peration)
By: Lin West
iv.
Memories imprisoned the man's thoughts. Empty eyes, limb bodies, the moon hanging low in the hemisphere, swollen to supernatural size and color. Red, a rusty Harvest Moon illuminated the Uchiha Manor and the wreckage of household. That night Itachi simply vanished; no body, no words. Not even after the news report or the investigation of his whereabouts. His absence a clear confession, both Sasuke and the police believed it so.
After that night, things for Sasuke changed. He knew the burden of conscious control become smothered under the weight of grief and loss, the eventual suicide attempt, life pumped back in his veins and down his throat, but most of all he intimately danced to feverish rage. How could he, his own brother, do this? Inconceivable evil of his own blood, blasphemous wicked embodiment of Cain… all the world's languages of words combined could not spell out the injustice and contempt he felt.
But he contained all of this. Compressed and stored it away. No, it would only show his weakness.
It was during such episodes of self-contained emotional rush he realized something strange; he could get into people's heads. Force them to do things, to see things. If he even wished it so, make them feel.
He supposed it to be some power of suggestion, whatever the truth it may be he did not question it or seek explanation for its origin. It only mattered that he could perform such feats. He exercised it, stretched its potential. Soon not only could he force others to see, he himself began to see the world differently. He could feel the residue of life's raw energy; the first time he felt it he thought he was experiencing a triple-orgasm. The ecstasy of touching raw energy was simply incomparable to anything he ever knew.
And then how simply the path unfolded before him. How destined it seemed.
He followed his brother's feel, it was terribly easy. Too easy, he found him in a matter of days. Standing face to face he realized why Itachi left – Sasuke wasn't the only one who found he could do interesting things with his mind. There were no words between them. None were needed; it was over in minutes with Sasuke a barely salvageable sac of nerve endings and broken will.
How many times past had Sasuke tried again and again to kill him? Sasuke himself lost track, but it was enough to give Itachi a taste for their game. He would refrain from full power blasts as he had exercised the first time. He took it slow, deepening the groves of misery before ripping them open. Sometimes he wouldn't even touch his mind, opting for physical torture – shattering bones, cutting muscle, dislocation, burning…
There were days when Sasuke could do nothing but scream and break things in frustration. Revenge. Yes, that his only aim for the past decade; an existence consumed in an unrelenting malice. It did not matter how, or if it was even by his own hand. He must die.
As the fates would have it, blood bade blood. The Uchiha House was not the only casualty that night. In the nearby small town chaos sucked in all its residence to the eternal nothingness. The culprit caught on tape, a young boy in a homicidal rage – driven mad. Sasuke's eyes knew better; he could see the inhuman red glinting in his eyes, the black fog of pure power: Demonic Possession. There was no other mortal possibility for the prowess and destruction the boy showed that night.
On shaky camera footage of a shirtless boy with a red spiral targeting the abdomen, nearly indiscernible from blood-soaked skin, Sasuke knew he found his answer, and find it he did. There was no denying the demonic manifestations. Sanguine stain spiraling out for each life taken; Sasuke absent-mindly recalled how the first stain's pricks were Naruto's own parents, according to the news coverage at least. The physical proof was not the final confirmation, no, he did not fully believe it until he felt it; his hand over the coiling red. He had never felt anything quite like it: elation, ecstasy, an endless reservoir of unhampered beautiful, raw energy.
Yes, it's him.