Just in case you forgot there were other characters in this story...

Itachi sat at his little wooden table in his little padded cell, drumming his fingers against the wood tabletop and listening to the tic of his clock as time passed, all the while studiously ignoring the new wooden puzzle that had been placed on the table in the middle of the night, when he had been asleep. The clock was a special one, custom made upon his request for an auditory timepiece, and chimed a different tune for every fifteen minute marker, a quiet ting for every minute and a louder one for every fifth minute, and chimed the number of the hour on the hour. Usually, Itachi was very fond of the clock and usually thought of it with much reverence, for, as demonstrated by many stories of people stranded alone in the wilderness, keeping track of passing time was often the best way of keeping oneself sane, but today he found himself hating it for the message it was telling him: Kisame was late.

Kisame was never late, not even after the day Itachi had told him he could see ghosts, back when he could see. Itachi bit his lip, nervousness causing the tempo of his drumming to ratchet up a notch. Why was Kisame late? As the seconds ticked by into minutes and the minutes into a half an hour, Itachi started to get worried. His father hadn't fired him, had he? Itachi knew he'd put Kisame in a tough position the day before when he'd demanded he stay in the room with Itachi when his father had asked him to leave, but that was a matter of patient security; he had to understand that. There was no way he'd fire Kisame over doing his job. Right?

Itachi's finger-drumming kicked up another notch as another explanation occurred to him. The cameras were supposed to go off in his room when someone was in with him for longer than a few minutes, but that wasn't always the case; accidents and mistakes, or purposeful observation that could be claimed an accident or mistake, were always possible, so it was always a possibility that someone could have a camera on at any given moment, even if Kisame was in the room with him. And many of the things Kisame had done while in the room with Itachi were definitely against the medical code and could get him fired. The extended, full-body physical contact, the occasional little gifts he managed to sneak in for Itachi, the secrets of his real job that he'd spilled- any single one of these was bad enough to get him sacked.

And then there was the kisses, those beautiful, warming kisses that were the kindest physical contact Itachi had received since far before his incarceration. Itachi felt a sudden desire to reach up and touch his lips as if he could still feel the echoes of pressure from someone else's mouth, but he quickly stamped out the urge. There were, after all, cameras still trained on him from every angle.

When the clock struck forty-five after eight o'clock, the hour Kisame was supposed to arrive, Itachi began to get really worried. If Kisame had been let go, they would have informed him as he was leaving the day before and arranged for a temporary nurse to bring him in his breakfast at the designated time instead of Kisame, but this unexplained absence of anyone, even just a temporary nurse, was unnervingly wrong. It was required by policy that Itachi be treated a certain way while in his ward, and part of that policy dictated that he be fed, on time, three meals a day. For this bad a breach of that policy to occur, something major must have happened.

Itachi had counted approximately four and a half minutes past eight forty-five when the door abruptly swung open with such force that it hit the padded wall behind it and would have warranted a resounding crash had the wall not been proofed against such attacks. He stood abruptly at the sound, sending his chair skittering back and almost flipping it over backwards onto the floor in his haste.

"Where have you-" Itachi started, mixed anger and relief in his voice, when whoever had opened the door took a hurried step forward into the room, and a cold hand squeezed his chest in a powerful grip.

It wasn't Kisame's footsteps.

A panic coursed through Itachi's veins, but he fought to keep under control, tightening his hands into fists and then releasing them to release the tension building up in his body. You aren't crazy, he reminded himself, curling and uncurling his fists again. You can control yourself; you have no excuse not to.

"Where's Kisame?" He demanded, trying and mostly succeeding in keeping his voice from turning into a growl.

The too-light footsteps faltered for a second, then continued into the room, closing the door behind her. Itachi didn't think he'd ever had this particular nurse before, but he could tell by the gait that it was a woman, and a young one at that. Ignoring his question, the young nurse walked over to his table with a tray - the silverware was real, another infraction; and good heavens, was that a knife? She must be new around here; knives, even butter knives, were only awarded to the most sane inmates, something he was most definitely not considered - and set it down at the table.

"Good morning, Patient Doe!" She chirped energetically with a slight Hispanic accent, but Itachi could sense an undercurrent of fear in her otherwise chipper tone. "I deeply apologize for the tardiness of your meal. It won't happen again."

"I don't care about the food," Itachi snapped, feeling the rising tide of anger threatening to swamp over him again at her overly rolled r's, energetic Spanish lilt, and inability to tell him what he wanted to know. "I want to know the answer to my question! Where is Kisame? My usual attendant?"

The nurse gave a tiny sound halfway between a gulp and a gasp, and her clothing rustled as she drew back on herself in fear, then shook her head and squared her shoulders. "I'm sorry, but that's a question I can't answer. Now, if you would, please eat your breakfast."

She pushed the tray towards him, and Itachi's olfactory senses were suddenly assaulted but the smell of lightly toasted wheat bread, already buttered with a generous amount of what smelled like orange marmalade. He should have been glad; this was a better breakfast than he had been served in ages, but he also knew he was kept on a much stricter diet than the other patients. Such a deviation from his normal routine, the lateness and the unusual breakfast, made Itachi even more worried than he was before. What was going on?

"Why can't you tell me where he is?" Itachi demanded, deepening his breathing to control his heart rate. He didn't want the intercom crackling to life now; without Kisame to prevent it, he would definitely be sedated if it did.

This time, the nurse wasn't even phased by his reaction, obviously more confident now that she had a line she could feed him. "I'm sorry, but I can't answer that question either. Now eat your breakfast, please."

Itachi turned his face downwards, as if looking at the plate of food he couldn't see. He obviously wasn't getting anywhere like this, so he might as well switch tactics.

Turning around, Itachi groped around blindly for his chair before pulling it back to the table and sitting down, and was rewarded by the sound of the nurse sitting opposite him. He waited a few seconds, wondering if she was going to offer any kind of assistance, but when none was forthcoming, he set about exploring the tray himself. With excruciating slowness so as not to knock anything over, he pushed his fingertips along the tray until they hit the edge of a plate, which, he discovered, housed two slices of toast buttered with what was, in fact, orange marmalade, a fact he discovered when he stuck his finger in it and had to lick it off. To the right of the plate was a full set of silverware, knife, fork and spoon, which Itachi found silly and wasteful for just a plate of toast, and on the right side of the plate was an open-topped plastic glass filled with apple juice, which he again discovered when he stuck his finger in it and had to lick it clean.

What the hell is that girl doing over there? Itachi seethed inside of himself. Is this normal eating behavior where she comes from, or is she just not seeing what I'm doing?

Now royally pissed off, Itachi listened in the direction of the young nurse, and was appalled when a faint sound not unlike keyboard clicks assaulted his ears. Is she on her phone? He thought suddenly, his blood beginning to boil. Seriously?

Taking another deep breath to steady his rising heart rate, Itachi folded his hands on his lap and addressed the nurse. "You're fairly new here, correct?"

"Hmm?" The nurse murmured, her hair rustling as she looked up from her phone. "Oh, yes I am. Just started last week."

"Ah." Itachi nodded sagely. "That explains things."

That got her attention. "Explains what?" She asked nervously, her voice getting louder as she leaned forward.

"Oh, just a few little things," Itachi said, leaning back on his chair. "Like the fact that you didn't notice I'm blind."

There was a few seconds of silence as the nurse looked at him, then the meaning of the bandage finally sunk in and she almost jumped from her seat in apology.

"Oh, gosh, I'm so sorry, Patient Doe; I didn't even realize-"

But Itachi held up a hand to stop the deluge of words erupting from her mouth. "It's alright; after all, you clearly haven't had any experience working with me before, since you also brought me the wrong breakfast."

"Wh- what?"

"I'm on a special diet, so I don't get the standard meal. I mostly eat things with a spoon, because it's easier for me to manage. Also, all my drinks come with a cover so I don't spill them."

"Like a sippy cup?" The snicker was clear in the young woman's voice.

"Yes," Itachi said distastefully. "Like a sippy cup. But that's not quite everything; you see, you also brought me real cutlery." He held up the knife as proof, tilting it as if examining it with a nonexistent gaze. "Surely you must be familiar with the rule that states any patient with suicidal tendencies or a history of self harm must be issued plastic silverware at every meal?"

A nervous laugh filled the room. "But you're not-"

"How do you think I went blind?" Itachi interrupted calmly.

There was a few seconds as the woman digested what he's said - God, she was so slow! - before a loud gasp shattered the silence and she grabbed the fork and spoon from the tray, babbling almost incoherently. "Oh gosh-! I didn't even-! Patient Doe-"

"Again with the Patient Doe!" Itachi exclaimed with a frown. "Why are you calling me that?"

"There… There's no last name on your door, so I assumed-"

"That I was an amnesiac?" Itachi supplied half cheerfully, half cynically, twirling the knife between his fingers. "That I didn't know who I was? That I was a state charity case, a blithering idiot more child than man? Because if that's the case, you're sorely mistaken."

"But… But… Patient Doe-!"

"I have a name!" Itachi snapped, allowing a tiny fragment of his anger to bleed into his voice as he gripped the knife tightly in his hand, stopping its rotational motion. "And I'd appreciate if you'd use it!"

"Patient Itachi!" There was real fear in the nurse's voice now. "Give me the knife!"

"Gladly," Itachi answered more calmly, but he was smirking on the inside. He placed the knife in the table, the blade facing toward himself, and slid it across the table, where the nurse hastily snatched it up. "I think you're in enough trouble already without me adding anything else to it."

The nurse froze all movement, even her breathing becoming startlingly silent. "Trouble?" She asked nervously, the silverware in her hand clinking dully as she gripped it too tightly.

"It's impressive, really, that you know so little of the rules in the place you work, though I suppose you could easily rectify that if you spent as much time listening to your instructions as you do on your phone."

Itachi allowed a bite of contempt to enter his tone at that last, and he could almost feel the nurse flinch backwards from the ice in his voice. He didn't give her any time to recover, however, launching into another barrage of words before she could respond.

"And the amount, too," Itachi continued, whistling lightly in contemptuous amazement. "Seven infractions, and all in the span of- well, I was going to say two minutes, but you were almost an hour late, so I guess it was more than two minutes, wasn't it?"

"Seven?" The nurse's voice was faint, as if she felt suddenly lightheaded. "What… What are the other ones?"

Itachi allowed a wicked grin to flash across his face, and he felt the nurse flinch back away from him again. "Why, if I told you, that would ruin the fun, now wouldn't it?"

"A… Ar…" The nurse tried to say something, but only stuttered until she managed to clear her throat and try again. "Are you going to report me?"

"I could…" Itachi rubbed his chin as if thinking it over. "Or, perhaps, you could convince me into silence with, say, the reason why you're here and not my usual attendant."

"But… But… There's confidentiality-"

"Confidentiality is for patients, not workers," Itachi interrupted, crossing his arms over his chest. "Are you going to tell me, or am I going to have to inform your supervisors of your lapses in judgement today?"

"All right, I'll tell you!" The nurse finally gave in, slamming the silverware down onto the table with a dull clank. "Just don't get me fired! I need this job, otherwise I'll never pay off medical school!"

Bingo. Itachi knew a different tactic was all he needed. Leaning forward eagerly, he asked, "So, what's the deal? Where's Kisame?"

"I don't know for sure, but I heard that he just didn't show up, then he called fifteen minutes after he was supposed to come in and said that something was wrong, a family emergency or something, and he wouldn't be able to make it in for the next few days."

Itachi frowned; something in that explanation didn't exactly line up. "A family emergency? Are you sure?"

"I don't know; that's just what I heard!" The nurse's voice trembled with nervousness. "That's all I know, I swear! Please don't get me fired!"

"Don't worry; I'm not that hard-hearted. We did make a deal." The response came on instinct, the autopilot turned on as his mind focused all his attention on digesting the information she had told him.

Her fears assuaged, the nurse leaned forward and asked curiously, "How do you know all this stuff?"

"Well, I have been here a very long time. It does behoove me to know how I should be treated," Itachi said with a chuckle, leaning back in his chair and placing his hands behind his head. This might be a little fun. More fun than just sitting around, anyway.

"But it's got to be more than that; you know these rules inside and out!" There was something akin to admiration in the nurse's voice, but the emotion did nothing to overshadow her residual fear.

"Hmm…" Itachi mused, drumming his fingers on the table thoughtfully. "Well, I did have a life before I was here, though maybe that's a foreign concept to you. Let's just say I know the rule book so well because once upon a time, I had to use it."

Itachi could almost hear the gears turning in the nurse's head as she worked her way through what he'd just said. "You mean… You mean you used to work here?"

"Hmm." Itachi neither confirmed nor denied her assumption, but she must have taken his noncommittal response as an affirmative because she didn't question him about it further.

"Why are you here now? I mean, I know you said your… eyes… but why did you get put here?"

Itachi tilted his head up to the ceiling, a sudden urge to give a serious response catching in his throat. Violence, probably. I don't even know what's in my file, but I did blind myself. Anything can be erased if you put enough money into it, including a person's existence; Daddy Dearest taught me that. That's why my full name's not on the door. I don't even technically exist anymore.

But he swallowed the words back down again. He'd already told Kisame his sorry excuse for a life's story, and look what that had gotten him. There was no reason this woman had to get hurt as well.

Keeping his face upturned, Itachi fixed a sadistically cruel smile on his mouth, then allowed an equally cruel laugh to escape him. That feral smile still on his face, he allowed his chin to drop until his bandaged gaze was focused directly on the black space in his vision that he knew, by the position of her voice, would house the nurse's face.

"Why don't you do your job and read my case file before you walk into my room? It's best to be prepared; after all, I might be dangeroussss." He drew the last word out in a hiss, the chilling sound permeating the room like a cold wind.

The nurse immediately jerked backwards, scattering the silverware onto the floor with a sharp clatter. Itachi could practically smell the fear exuding from her pores, but perhaps that was only his imagination.

"Are… Are you?" She stuttered, drawing back and dropping to the ground to scrabble for the fallen silverware.

Itachi stood up slowly, scraping his chair across the floor. A sound like nails on a chalkboard ripped through the room, muffled slightly by the soft padding on the walls. The nurse, he could tell, wanted to scream, or at least cry out, but a combination of fear and training kept her frozen and silent.

"I don't know," Itachi snarled. "Am I?"

"You- You're mad!" The nurse spat, inching away from him and back towards the door. "A fucking lunatic!"

That struck something deep within Itachi, and his cruel smile faltered for a second. "That is what they tell me," he spat back, but this time, there was a little sadness mixed in with his anger.

The nurse didn't pick up on the sadness, or if she did, she ignored it, allowing her fear to get the better of her as she scrambled back towards the door. "Of course that's what they tell you; you're crazy! That's why you're here!"

"No!" Itachi snapped, the hurt the statement caused making it sound more waspish than he intended. He softened his tone, turning his face away from the door and nurse. "I'm here because someone else told me I was crazy."

He could almost see the nurse shake her head before he finished his sentence. "You're delusional. I don't know your story, but I do know that this is the best place for you. You may be some kind of genius, but you're still a mad one."

A bitter smile pulled up the corners of Itachi's mouth. "Am I?"

"Yes, you are!" The nurse fumbled with the doorknob, but didn't open the door. "You're a lunatic, and I never want to see you again! I'm leaving right now, and I'm never coming back! Someone else can clean up after your crazy ass, because I certainly won't do it!"

"Then leave!" Itachi snarled, sweeping a hand in the general direction of the door. "What's stopping you?"

"Our... d-deal…" The nurse stuttered, clutching the doorknob harder and causing its bolts to tinkle. "It still holds, right?"

His upper lip curling into a distasteful grimace, Itachi shook his head in disapproval. "You know, that's why I can't stand people like you; you can never believe in the word of someone you don't know. Well, sweetheart, the word of a madman is one of the few things you can trust about him, because it's the one of the only things he has left."

"A man's word is only as good as his mind!" The nurse accused, terror causing her voice to shake almost uncontrollably.

Anger coursed through Itachi with a heat like a furnace at that, bringing something to the surface that he hadn't felt in a long time: hatred. Baring his teeth in his most terrible smile yet, Itachi snarled, "Then I guess you're just going to have to take that chance, aren't you?"

The nurse spat something at Itachi in Spanish too quickly for him to understand, but he did catch el Diablo somewhere in the middle and he had the sinking feeling that she might be genuflecting at the same time as well. The door was wrenched open with almost the same amount of force as the first time she'd opened it, sending it, with a muffled crash, into the soft wall behind it as she fled the room. With a sound much louder than the one it made against the wall, the door slammed shut, the sound of the lock clicking shut resounding through the room like a death knell.

Completely unperturbed, or with at least the semblance of not caring, Itachi sat back down and reached for a piece of toast. He never particularly cared for the young nurses, or the older ones either, for that matter. They were crotchety and set in their ways, and the younger ones, the millennials, weren't much better in the stubbornness department. He supposed that it was a generational thing; his particular brand of dark humor didn't sit well with anyone over the age of sixty or below the age of thirty. He'd made many nurses run screaming from his room before, and this one wouldn't be any different. Though the cursing in Spanish and accusations of being possessed by the Devil were new.

Oh, he knew it had been wrong, but Itachi had so enjoyed scaring the pants off that nurse! Everything about her had irritated him, from her falsely chipper voice to her blatant disregard for the rules. The infractions she'd racked up in the scant few minutes she'd been with Itachi had been astonishing, to say the least. Not all of them had been major, but all together, they were definitely enough to get her fired.

One: the breakfast being late. This one probably wasn't her fault, just a byproduct of a difficult situation, but Itachi felt petty enough that he wanted to pin it on her anyway.

Two: bringing the wrong breakfast. Again, this one probably wasn't entirely her fault, but there definitely were actions she could have taken to prevent it if she'd been paying attention.

Three: inattention to a patient with extra needs. Though, considering her inability to even bring him the right breakfast, that wasn't very surprising.

Four, and the start of the more major infractions: cell phone use in the room of a patient. Private electronic use, especially the use of mobile phones, was forbidden in the presence of anyone in the institution.

Five: the cutlery. This was the biggest one, probably enough to get her fired by itself.

Six: not reading a patient's file before attending to them. Going in to see a patient unprepared and uninformed was one of the most dangerous things a nurse in this line of work could do.

And seven: allowing a patient to manipulate you into giving them what they want.

Itachi smiled and bit into his piece of toast, savoring the strong and much anticipated taste of orange marmalade on his tongue. Baiting that nurse had been one of the most fun things he'd done in a while, though he knew Kisame wouldn't have approved.

The sweetly buttered toast suddenly turned bland in Itachi's mouth as he thought of Kisame. The nurse had explained why she had come instead of him, but Itachi still felt like he hadn't been given the whole story. A family emergency. Kisame had voluntarily told him that the only person he considered his family had died years ago. What, then, could his 'family emergency' be? An unexpected reunion with his father's gang? Or was it a cover for something else entirely?

The soggy mouthful of bland toast Itachi was chewing turned to ash in his mouth as his throat suddenly went dry. With a grimace, he swallowed the food in his mouth, the rough bread scraping against his dry throat, and set the last remaining crust back down on the plate. He'd lost his appetite.

So, in reality, all Itachi had learned was that Kisame hadn't been fired; he was still no closer to finding out why Kisame hadn't shown up or when he was coming back. If he was coming back.

Itachi laid his head down on the table, suddenly too tired to do anything else. He missed Kisame: his warm hands, his soft voice, and his wonderful way of making Itachi feel sane. He just hoped Kisame would be coming back soon.