A/N: OMG, I am SO SORRY for the huge break. It's seriously not all my fault! My computer got a virus and was out of commision for a while. So sorry.

Breaking Point

/Almost hope you're in Heaven

So no one can hurt your soul/

My feet sink into the soft ground, my once blue-gray sandals splattered with fresh dirt.

With a sigh, I impale the earth with my shovel and survey my newly dug hole. And try not to act like I've just dug a grave for the one person I've ever really cared about in my whole, worthless, life.

It looks big enough.

It better be, cuz I'm done digging.

A droplet of water lands on the bridge of my nose and I stare up into the sky. I know it's a dismal gray, but it doesn't seem that way. Ever since that day, the world has seemed bright, so painfully bright. I can hardly bear to look at it.

I turn to the simple wooden coffin in which Itachi lies. I fixed up his body as best I could and dressed him in clean clothes.

The large robe covers his wounds, and he looks so peaceful, his dying smile on his face.

I crouch down and dig my fingers under the unfinished wood of the coffin and struggle to lift it. I want to do this alone.

Splinters of wood pierce my fingers as I stagger over to the hole, dropping to my knees and lowering the wooden box into darkness.

I carefully pick out the splinter, and am in the middle of piling the dirt over the coffin before I realize that I'm crying. Again.

This is becoming something of an unpleasant habit.

The tears continue to flow, and I am so glad I came alone.

Sitting in the middle of a forest beside a partly covered grave, I finally release the overwhelming sadness. My body shaking and desperate wracking my frame, I let it out. Let myself cry in the hope that that will make it less painful in the end.

But when it's finally over, it's not. Not any better. Actually, it's worse.

I hung everything on Itachi, and opened up to him, and because of that, it feels as if there's a gaping wound inside me.

Its edges burn, and I can't staunch the blood.

I bend down, wrapping my arms around my chest in an effort to suppress the agony that threatens to break me in two.

It is a long time before I can even sit up again.

Shaking, I rise to my feet and start pushing the remaining dirt over the coffin with my foot.

Gripping the rusted metal handle of the shovel, I pull it out and turn, striding off.

I don't look back, because a markerless, freshly dug grave is not what I want to remember. I reach the nearest tree and leap up, gripping the thick branch and propelling my feet upward. Jumping from tree to tree, I run, trying to escape what this has brought me. But this feeling is something I can't outrun.

As I reach the Akatsuki base, I slow to a walk.

I remember the first time I came through this entrance.

I stumble, my foot catching on a loose rock. A heavy hand on my shoulder rights me. To afraid to look up at him, I feel his hot, putrid breath against the curves of my pale face. My hands tied together behind my back, I turn instead to look at the man on my left.

He is thinner, shorter, and less muscular than his companion; not nearly as intimidating. Yet he is the one who got my into this mess, him and those beautiful, maddening, red eyes.

My hands pull against their bonds, because more than anything I want to feel those eyes explode underneath my palms. The clay in my arm pulses violently, because I want to kill them, feel their thick, hot, blood splatter against my face.

I want to kill them all.

But of course I won't, because I am weak, infuriatingly weak.

But I won't be weak for long. If there's one thing I get out this whole experience, it will be strength.

One day those red eyes will look up into my gray ones with fear, instead of the other way around.

The hatred cursing through my veins now will burst through, and his blood will stain the floor.

I am not entirely sure how Itachi went from being my most hated person to being my most precious person.

It probably would've been easier, and definitely more sensible, if I had kept on hating him.

But I have never been sensible, and have always made things difficult for myself.

So that's it, now (all there is) as I stride down the hallway.

I walk past people (push back people) as I go, but aren't there, not really. They're just smears of color and shape and sound.

Some of them try to speak to me; try to touch me, reaching out with their hands like claws.

I pull back, crouching away from them, pressing into myself. I wrap my arms around myself, hard enough to hold my self together (hard enough to break me).

I barely make it to my room before collapsing onto my knees, once again. I don't think I can do it, don't think I can uphold this façade any longer, and I don't want to try anymore.

The cracks have been there, always, or at least for a very long time. But I've also always thought I've done a good job of hiding it, of stitching up those cracks.

The stitches are falling, now, ripping, tearing, unraveling.

My vision is red, red as the stormy sun, red as the blood that splatters, red as those eyes.

When a person dies, they leave something; leave their people, their precious people, behind.

I am still here.

Is that what I am?

No, never.

Slowly the red starts to retreat, slinking back to the corners of my eyesight and crouching just behind my vision.

I stand, suddenly cold. The pain is gone, or at least, I can't feel. But then, I don't feel anything, right now.

I've become numb.

There is one matter of business I need to attend to, and I calmly walk over to the closet.

Placing my hand on the door, I wrench it open, strength evident in the sharp, quick, movement. He stares up at me with shaded eyes, gag still firmly in place.

I look down at him and smirk, as if daring him to comment on my tearstained face.

I lift him and sling him backwards over my shoulder, lean arms wrapping around his legs.

I bend slightly at the knees, pulling open the back door that only I have. I put it in myself, because I didn't trust the Akatsuki (I still don't) and I wanted a handy escape route if needed.

It's a short, hidden door, usually behind my desk.

Crouching down, I crawl through the small entryway; ignoring the fact that Sasuke's head is scraping the top of the door frame.

As I step outside, bright sunlight hits my face, warming my cheek; but it's only a meaningless physical sensation, and right now I can't make it seem like anything else.

And I don't want to, either; because that'd mean showing the pain and I can't do that, can't let Sasuke see.

I'll be fine, soon. In a few days I'll be laughing and joking just like before. I recover fast, and have for a while, because if I didn't I probably wouldn't be alive.

(a long time ago I stopped waiting for the red to abate, and settled for seeing it, ever present, at the corners of my eyes)

So I see the world through a red haze as I dump the Uchiha unceremoniously to the ground and watch him clamber to his feet. He glowers at me, apparently having regained some of his inherit pride.

His eyes flash Sharingan, red as my vision. I fix him with a steely gray stare until he reverts back to his normal black. His red eyes remind me to much of another's, and on his face—I am not having that.

Still staring straight at him, I slice through his bindings with one chakra-enhanced sweep of my hand.

"Go," I tell him, and "I don't care where the hell you go as long as it's far away for here and you never come back."

"Like I would" he sneers, thick and angry and so unlike his brother. But broken, still, like all of us.

I want to slug him, hard, make him feel the pain for a change. More than anything I want to make him regret that he murdered Uchiha Itachi.

But I don't infuriatingly weak and inclined to believe in ridiculous things like the afterlife as I am.

"Well," I say briskly. "Run along, then."

"I was just going," he says, and turns to do so.

I stare silently at his retreating back for a moment; but the obnoxious loudmouth within me is so not letting him get away with the last word.

"Remember, Sasuke. be a good boy and open your legs for Orochimaru!" I call loudly.

Oops.

This, apparently, was the wrong thing to say, because he spins around to face me, eyes flashing a dangerous red.

Now that's a color I love.

"I'm not—he isn't—" He spits, anger making him incoherent.

I smirk. I've heard weird stories of Orochimaru before, of course, strange fetishes and such. But I never thought they were true, not really.

"Oohh…looks like I've hit a nerve, Sasuke-" I debate over it a moment before adding:"-kun!"

Sasuke stares hate at me, hate and fury and something that might just be pain.

"Shut…up…" he says, sounding strangely strangled.

And I would, if I was the kind of person who liked playing Peacekeeper.

But I'm not, and I want to fight, now more than ever.

"Aren't…aren't you a bit old for him?" I ask, any hesitation purposeful.

His eyes open freakishly wide for a second before narrowing. The black in his Sharingan eyes spins, morphing into-

Oh, crap.

I hadn't realized that he has Mangekyou now. But it makes sense, I guess, in a twisted Uchiha sort of way.

One translation is: To obtain Mangekyou Sharingan, you must slay your closest friend.

But, Itachi told me, on one of the long sleepless nights; it was much simpler than that, coming down only to spilled blood.

To achieve the Mangekyou Sharingan, you must spill the life blood of an Uchiha or of one loved by an Uchiha.

So it made sense, his curse, the ultimate curse of sacrifice.

I tear my eyes away from his, dropping my gaze to his feet. I trained against Itachi enough times to have mastered this technique fairly well, and Sasuke hasn't used these eyes before, so I should be okay.

There is a soft "shirrrk-"ing noise as Sasuke draws his blade.

I wasn't planning to fight, and have no weapons of the sort, but I do have my clay and my hands, and that'll be enough.

I grin as I reach a hand towards the pouch on my hip.

"Just remember—you asked for it, un!"