There is no way I can possibly justify what happened that night, except to say that I became so caught up in my sadistic pleasures that I failed to notice the obvious.
You see, this was an entirely different scenario than the incident that had transpired not but a few months ago, wherein I was stabbed by that kunoichi. That time, I'd let my guard down, because I'd been relying on Kisame to take care of his victims. This time, the fault rested squarely on my own shoulders.
As I was toying with my most recent foe (by which I mean mentally peeling off his skin, layer by layer and drinking in his sweet, agonized cries of despair), another one crept up on me, sporting weapons that I'd only seen in the torture chamber known as the Tsukiyomi. I failed to see him until it was too late for me to react. Luckily, the same could not be said for Kisame. Before the blades could even scratch my skin, my partner had leapt between myself and the attacker, using his own body as a shield.
My immediate reaction was to look down and see how much damage had been inflicted on Kisame. His sword had blocked one weapon, which was a small blessing. The other one, however, had buried itself fairly deeply in my partner's side, and looked as though it had pierced the hip bone. Kisame didn't cry out, so I tucked away the knowledge that this sort of attack to the pelvic area produces little pain. At least, compared to some injuries I could come up with on my own. But more on torture methods later.
My next move was predictable; kill the bastard. A kunai was in my hands a moment later, and not a second after that it had been hurled into the ninja's eye. Tragically, I used too much force, and the blade went straight through the optic organ and punctured his brain. I'd been hoping to give the man a long, painful death for what he'd done, but no matter.
Once I'd confirmed his death, my attention immediately returned to Kisame. He was crouching down on the ground, clutching at his still-bleeding side. The weapon had been removed while I disposed of his attacker, but he'd yet to have time to tend to his wound. Not saying a word, I brushed his hands aside and began seeing to the injury.
A quick brush of my fingertips over the area relieved my worst worries; no bones had been hit. No, the cold, cruel steel weapon had merely sunk into his side, and had not even had time to rip out a hunk of his flesh, tearing away the fragile muscle beneath, and giving the blade's wielder a clean shot to swing again and twist the knife upwards, thereby catching onto the delicate ribcage and tearing out the milky white bones underneath, causing the victim excruciating pain and-sorry, I got a bit carried away there.
Ahem. Anyway, I'd thought to bring along a medical kit on this assignment, knowing we'd encounter ninja. Pein's assignment had been to patrol the grounds within a twenty mile radius of the base; he had reason to believe that a band of ninja were closing in on the location of our hideout, and thus posed a threat to our organization. Our orders were simple; look around, kill any humans and threatening wildlife, ect.
As we made camp that night, I'd decided to be a little more forward than usual and tried to sleep back to back to Kisame. Naturally, when I felt his heart beating far faster than the norm, I questioned what was wrong, expecting news of the searched-for attackers. He confirmed my fears when he asked me to observe our surroundings with my eyes, and I saw our adversaries. He must have known to keep an eye out for them; else wise, I doubt he would have noticed them under the cover of night. Well well. It appeared that Kisame was learning to pay attention when we were briefed.
As the thoughts rushed through my head, my hands began bandaging my partner's wounds, wrapping the snow-colored gauze around his torso again and again. When I finally stopped the patch job, (which would have to last until we returned to the base and had Kakuzu stitch Kisame back together), my arms were wrapped around him in an almost hug. There was an awkward moment between us, and then my arms were back at my sides. I calmly informed Kisame that we could now head back to the base, and rose to my feet. The sooner we packed, the sooner we could leave this godforsaken wilderness and return to the semi-comfortable existence of the civilized world. "Shouldn't we finish the mission?" Kisame immediately inquired.
I gave him a look that teacher's normally reserve for students that have asked a particularly stupid question. What did he think we'd been doing just then?! Suddenly, the truth dawned on me. There could only be one explanation for Kisame's rapid heartbeat, his inquiring as to something in the forest, and then asking me if we needed to finish our assignment.
His ninja instincts had kicked in, and he was suspicious of other bands of fiends hiding themselves away in the forest.
An honest mistake, to be certain, but it was still enough to make me frown. Calmly, I reminded him that Pein had sent us out to fine one band, not multiple groups, that posed a threat to us.
He blinked, and muttered a soft, "Oh," in response, whilst I could only shake my head and return to the packing. He soon joined me, and not but a few moments after that, we were off again. I chose against taking the lead; instead, I walked alongside Kisame in a defensive position.
During our trek, he shied away from my side constantly; I merely returned as soon as the gap was noticed. Finally, after the fifth or so time that this happened, I told him to quit moving away, though not as kindly as that.
"Sorry Itachi-san. It's just...erm..." his eyes flicked down to the knife in my palm, before returning to my face.
Suddenly, it clicked. "Do you honestly think I'm going to hurt you?" If you've ever seen a deer suddenly blinded by a great flash of light, paralyzed and unable to escape, you'll understand the look I saw on Kisame's paler than usual face then.
At that moment, I had to make a decision. What I was about to say may or may not reassure my partner; but it would definitely increase my chances of being harmed by him, if he was ever given the opportunity. "Kisame," I began, trying my best to keep my voice from wavering, "if I wanted to hurt or kill you, I would have done so long ago during one of countless opportunities that any assassin would have leapt at. As it stands, I have absolutely no intention of harming you."
Too late I realized that my bandaging job had been flawed, and his wound must have reopened and bled badly, because not a second after I finished my speech, the anemically pale shark fainted dead away.