Disclaimer: Naruto, his friends and the universe they live in don't belong to me but to Masashi Kishimoto. I write this story solely for my own pleasure and don't make any money with it.
Warning: The story contains spoilers up to chapter 398.
I thought of abandoning the story after the recent revelations, which I am very happy about. Some reviews, and some encouragement from my beta, eowyn unquendor made me however continue it. Also I had already invested some time and work into it, so that I did not want to abandon it... It is now almost finished, and I hope that I can type it out and upload it rather quickly.
To be honest, I had no idea at that time whether Itachi had really wanted to pluck out his brother's eyes. Now, after all the discussions I have had with Sasuke, I think that I know the answer, but I did not when we were watching the video.
To be honest, at that time I did not care to know the truth, and even less did I care that Sasuke should know it. I wanted him to join me with my plans, that was all.
In the morning I went outside to get some fresh air, and when I returned I found Sasuke in the kitchen, washing out his eye one time after the other. I stood still, moved by the sight, in a way that I would never have held possible. He dried his eye, looked for a shiny surface he might use as a mirror, yet found none but the metal of the kitchen sink. He bent down, pushed up his lid with his fingers, looked into his eye, and then, obviously not content with what he saw, he washed his eye again.
I withdrew. He did not need to know that I had been watching him. When I heard that he had left the kitchen I went in to prepare breakfast, and Sasuke joined me when everything was ready, but though I had set a plate for him he would not sit down with me; he just grabbed his coffee mug, poured himself some coffee and drank it standing.
I did not say anything – he would get himself some food when he was hungry. (I did not have the impression that he was going to starve himself to death in protest against his imprisonment – and anyway, I regarded him rather as my guest than my prisoner.)
I waited for him to start the conversation, and I did not have to wait for long.
"Why did you tell me that Itachi was trying to protect me?" he asked.
"Isn't it obvious?" I asked back.
I watched in amusement how his expression changed from coolness and emotionlessness to confusion. After a few minutes of thinking he admitted that he had no idea.
"I had to find an explanation for the Amaterasu that fired when you saw my Sharingan."
"And was it the correct explanation?"
"It's as correct as it makes sense. There is, however, another explanation that also makes sense."
"Which one?"
"His hatred for me. Giving you his Amaterasu was his last chance to finish me off."
"And why did he hate you? Weren't you his accomplice in that night?"
"I was."
"And also later, in Akatsuki?"
"That's a bit more complicated. When he joined he did not know that it was my organization. I was still pretending to be some idiot dreaming of a criminal career. He did not know that I had Zetsu contact him when he had just left the Leaf village and did not know what to do. Later he discovered me and found out my true identity."
"He served you well, didn't he."
"Mostly. Sometimes I thought that he was a bit on the lazy side when it came to capturing the kyuubi's jinchuuriki, failing every single time, always with a new rather weak excuse. On the other hand I had to admit that the boy was well protected."
Sasuke spilled some coffee. I thought that it was a mere coincidence and offered him some piece of cloth to clean the table. He pretended not to see it, so that I had to do it myself.
"I met him and Kisame four years ago", he said, in a completely different tone: no longer fighting, but thoughtful. "They were trying to catch him, but, as you said, he was too well protected."
I waited for the obvious question: Why we wanted the jinchuuriki or rather the kyuubi itself in our power. He did not ask it.
"Maybe he wanted the kyuubi for himself", he mused instead. "But he was not strong enough yet."
"His eyesight was deteriorating quickly", I objected. "Waiting did not improve his chances."
"That's why he attacked me before he ventured to fight the jinchuuriki again." He seemed strangely pleased with this idea. "First make the Mangekyou Sharingan permanent, then gain power over the kyuubi."
"This does not explain why he transferred his Mangekyou Sharingan to you."
"As you said: He wanted to finish you off."
He poured himself another mug of coffee and finally sat down, though not where I had set the table for him. He leant back and stretched.
"You still have no explanation for this last point", I reminded him. "Why do you think it was so important to him to kill me?"
"He's always been ambitious", he explained. "He has always wanted to be the strongest ninja of the world, and most of all the strongest Uchiha, so you were in his way. He had to prove that he was stronger than you. When the student surpasses his master, he is ready for the next step. Just as I surpassed and defeated Orochimaru."
"Did you kill him?"
"No. I captured him in the internal dimension he used for his soul migration ritual. I am not Itachi. I only kill those who deserve it."
Again I wondered. He, in the meantime, attempted to pour himself a third mug of coffee, but there was only enough left to fill it to a quarter of its height. He shook the coffee pot and managed to get a few more drops out of it. Sometimes he was really weird.
"You think you are very clever, don't you", I said, not knowing whether I meant the coffee or the way he had got to his conclusions.
"I would not call myself particularly clever", he answered. "But I am not stupid either. Why?"
"Thinking that you know everything and don't have to listen to what I have to tell you."
"Why should I listen to you? You are my enemy, aren't you?"
His words hurt me, but I tried not to show it.
"You did listen to Itachi", I replied, and managed to hurt him in return. He focussed on the coffee pot.
"I told you already, I am no longer your foe", I said in a gentler tone than before. "I wish you well."
He did not answer but tried again to get some coffee out of the pot. "It's empty", he declared at last.
I took the pot, opened the lid and looked inside. "That's true", I said. I was a bit annoyed because I would have liked another cup, and he had had almost three. He looked at me as if he expected me to make more coffee, but I returned his glare. Maybe I should offer to explain to him how to use the coffee machine, I thought.
Abruptly he stood up and left to his room. I cleared up, prepared a new pot of coffee that I intended to drink all by myself, and went outside to enjoy the sun and to relax from the strain that talking to him had put on me.
I was not making much progress, I realized. He still distrusted me, he still did not show any interest in what I had to tell him, but rather made up his own theories, short-circuited as they were. And I needed him to listen to me if I wanted him to join me in my plans – to listen to me and to believe me. I wondered how Itachi had made him do whatever he wanted.
Yet Itachi's ways were not mine. I would not hurt him, nor endanger his life, and also – Sasuke had loved his brother before he hated him. He had adored him and strived to become like him, and some of this had survived the massacre of the clan. Itachi had been able to use this love to manipulate Sasuke, but this option was not open to me.
I could only reveal more of the truth, I thought, of a truth that would make me appear in a favourable light. I cursed Itachi for telling Sasuke about me, about my Mangekyou Sharingan, about my brother, about me helping Itachi in that night – this was worse than the Amaterasu that he had implanted into his brother's eye. I wished that Sasuke had not believed him – I wished that I could have gained his trust just by caring for him.
Also I had to do something about Akatsuki. The Leaf had done a great job of helping me to get rid of them, finishing off Sasori, Hidan and Kakuzu, and Sasuke had killed Deidara and Itachi. Kisame had not been killed but had surrendered after his partner's death, which was a bit inconvenient, but as he knew neither my true identity nor the location of the statue we had used to store the bijuus' chakra, it did not really matter. Zetsu was irrelevant, only Pein and Konan were dangerous. Pein particularly. If he neither managed to capture the kyuubi's jinchuuriki, nor got killed by him, he might grow desperate and use the bijuus we already had collected for his atomic bomb jutsu.
Only that I did not really want him to capture the jinchuuriki. I hoped that Zetsu would return soon, with the news that the Konoha team had defeated Konan and Pein.
Maybe I would have to do something to ensure the victory of the Konoha team, I thought, just as I had made sure Sasuke would win against Itachi.
I heard him in the kitchen. So he is hungry after all, I thought. I stretched, thinking that I would leave him undisturbed and give him a chance to breakfast without my annoying presence. To my surprise however he joined me outside, bringing his food and his coffee mug with him. He sat down next to me, having his breakfast, and again it was him who began to talk:
"It still does not make sense", he said.
"What?"
"That Itachi wanted to protect me from you. I mean, you saved my life and tended to my wounds. I'd be worse off without you."
You would have to learn to use the coffee machine I thought irritatedly as he poured himself another cup.
"Why did you save my life?"
"Because I care for you", I answered, and at that moment, sitting outside in the sun, relaxing and relieved that he was finally sitting next to me, in a fairly relaxed mood, it was the truth.
"You care for me? Why that? You don't seem the kind of person who runs around caring for other people."
"Well, first, you are the last survivor of my clan, except for myself. I want you to live and revive it."
"It's not as if you had nothing to do with the fact that there is no one left except you and me..."
"That's true", I answered, though he had indeed spotted the weak point in my argument. "But it's more complicated than you think. And I honestly want you to refound it and return it to its old glory."
"You could refound it yourself. Then you would have what you want: A revived clan according to your very own wishes. Is this not what you want?"
"It doesn't work like this with children", I replied. "They rarely turn out according to one's own wishes. Besides, I would need to marry for this, and I am too old to find a young woman who would have me."
"I don't think so. You are a powerful shinobi, aren't you? Most women throw themselves at the most powerful shinobi they can find."
I wondered where he had learnt this wisdom. Also I wondered about the turn our conversation had taken.
"I would not be able to love a woman who acts like this", I answered him. "Actually I don't think that I will fall in love with any woman. I loved once, and was loved, by a woman who had no equal among all the women of the world, and I won't give my heart to any other who is far beneath her."
"You might marry without loving", he said, clearly unimpressed by my speech. "A lot of people do."
"You don't know what you are talking about!" My words sounded sharper than I had intended them. "You are too young and have not yet learnt what it means to love!"
He looked at me, rather astonished that I had got that emotional, then he turned his face back to the sun, closing his eyes, enjoying the warmth.
"You still haven't told me why Itachi wanted to protect me from you when your true intention was to save me and make sure that I survive to refound the clan."
"There are worse things than death."
"As being blind, for example."
His answer surprised me, and it took me a while before I had worked out what he might mean.
"I don't need your eyes", I said.
"I know. You have already made your Mangekyou Sharingan permanent."
I did not know what to answer to this, and there was a break in our conversation, but then he took it up again.
"It doesn't make sense", he said. "Nothing makes sense. You helped Itachi kill the clan, and now you want me to revive it. Itachi gave me his Amaterasu to protect me against you when in truth you were going to save me."
"You are making progress", I said. "You are beginning to think."
"Well, maybe. But it doesn't really matter." Suddenly his voice had again that weird, satisfied tone. "You helped Itachi kill the clan, so I will kill you."
"Ah, will you?" I asked back. I tried to sound amused, and to hide my disappointment: So it was back to field one. "But if you will accept some advice from me", I continued, "then you wait until you have fully recovered, or I will crush you between two fingers. Actually I believe that I will crush you between two fingers anyway, if you don't wait until you are much stronger than you are now. You may have some coffee in the meantime."
He held his cup to me so that I could pour him some. So he seemed to accept both coffee and advice.
"Did you really help him kill the clan?" he asked suddenly.
I hesitated for a minute. I might have lied, and he might have believed me at that moment, but I have never been good at lying. I have learnt to tell half-truths, to bend the truth, to distract from the most important points and manipulate people by telling what they want to hear – but I have never been good at answering a direct question with a plain lie.
And so I answered: "I did."
