Author's Note: So apparently for a few weeks now, FF developed a bug which prevented email alerts from being sent to anyone who followed/favorited this story. Before you start reading this chapter, please be informed that I posted two previous chapters during the time that the bug went unfixed: Chapter 28 - Give What is Due and Chapter 29 - A Brother's Decision. Sounds familiar? Then great! You've probably read them. You may proceed with this chapter. Not familiar? Hold it right there and go back two chapters. And then you can proceed with this one. Cheerios! Oh and before somebody starts torching me with copyrights stuff, here is a disclaimer saying that most of these characters are not mine. Also, certain scenes from these chapter were taken directly from the Naruto Shippuden anime...even the lines of the characters (some lines are tweaked a bit but they're basically Kishimoto's idea). Let's make that clear awryt?
The trip started with an unexpected wake up call at three in the morning. Shiori would have put up a fuss had it not been for what came out of Sora's lips next.
"We're heading to the headquarters in Mount Jofuka in ten minutes. Itachi's orders."
Shiori was ready in eight. And for the entire two-day journey, she want back and forth between relief and anxiety. Relief because Itachi was still alive. A crippling anxiety because of the knowledge that the nightmare was far from over.
Kisame greeted them upon their arrival. The pair arrived just after sunrise, a few hours ahead of the trio and had just finished settling down. He ordered Fudo and Sora to come with him in the main area for a mission briefing before turning to Shiori. It took all of her self-control to act stoic and uninterested.
"Third door on the left. He's waiting," Kisame said.
Shiori waited until she rounded up a corner before breaking into a jog. Once she reached the front of the third door, she all but ripped it open before hurrying inside, her breathing heavy, eyes rimmed with tears and her ponytail nearly undone.
"Itachi," she called out, fearing the worst. 'Has he gone after Sasuke-'
A soft tug at her hair made her jump. She spun around and came face to face with her koibito. He smiled down at her despite the fact that all he could see was the silhouette of her face. His vision got worse during their stay in Ishigakure and now he could barely see anything whenever his Sharingan was deactivated.
Shiori didn't miss a beat and tackled him into a hug. In response, he tilted her head up and planted a fervent kiss on her lips. They kissed until their lungs burnt and both had to come up for air. Shiori broke down and buried her face on his chest while he rested his chin on the top of her head, closing his eyes to focus on her hearbeat fluttering against his ribcage.
'I love you.'
The thought crossed his mind unexpectedly, making him twitch. He thought it seemed unfair to say it out loud now, considering the horrors which were quickly closing in on them.
Once Shiori got her bearings, she looked up at him with pleading eyes. "I heard about Sasuke. Listen to me..." She caressed his cheek with a shaking hand. The young man instinctively leaned against it.
"There has to be another way. You are brothers. He loves you. Given the chance, he will listen to you. I know it."
"It's not that simple."
Obsidian met gray. There was nothing left for him to say. She knew that look. It was a look which said that certain decisions had already been set in stone. But she couldn't afford to have any of it.
"No. Please! Don't be so selfish to throw your life away like this!"
Shiori could tell that she hit a nerve. He flinched away from her and stepped back as though burnt.
"Selfish? You think I'm doing this for myself?" His voice rose with every word and she could see an angry glint in his eyes. When he spoke again, he was quieter.
"Live and die for the village. Live and die for the clan. Don't play dumb with me, Shiori. You know more than anyone how I've lived with those words. Everything I did, I did to protect Konoha...and to protect the honor of the Uchiha name. Do not lecture me about selfishness."
"I won't even pretend to understand you."
"I don't expect you to."
Determination flashed across her face. "But you wanna know what I see? I see a man who has given up. People who want to live do not readily walk into their deaths, definitely not if they know there's a way out. And you, Itachi...you're too smart, too precious to end things like this." She took his hand in hers. It was a struggle to keep her voice steady. "You do not have to give up your life for anyone. Have you not given up enough?"
"The medicines have stopped working. One way or another, I don't have much time to make things right. I won't let you or anybody else ruin that chance for me. You ask whether I've given up enough? You know excactly what I've given up: Everything. Now tell me again why I shouldn't do it. My name and my honor are in tatters. What do I have left to live for?"
"Me, Itachi! You have me!"
She had one card left to play, one more shot at convincing him to live and she was banking everything she had on it.
A long pause fell between the two who were bound by the love they felt for each other and yet forced apart by the cruel circumstances being served to them. For Shiori, Itachi's reply felt like the last nail in the coffin.
"I'm sorry."
And with that, he moved past her and walked out of the room.
During the many years that she had worked for the Akatsuki, Sora had learned that packing up was always easier than looking for the right place to put her things on. Like every other asset they owned, she was a nomad. She didn't have a fixed place to call her home. Hence she always made an effort to make her designated room as homey as possible no matter how brief her stay was.
It was well after lunch time when she finally finished settling down in the new headquarters. With spare time in her hands, she decided to explore tha place and look for a quiet place she can meditate in. With everything that was happening around her, from the Akatsuki's dwindling number of shinobi to Shiori's self-diagnosed "stomach flu", she needed time to clear her head before she can think straight.
She made her way to the north corridor and opened the door at the end of it which led to the study room. It was a square room lined with shelves upon shelves of books and scrolls. At one corner was a row of desks and on one of it, crouched over a reading article, was one of the sources of her woes.
"I was hoping to get some alone time but I guess you beat me to it," she said to the Rinha descendant.
Shiori looked up and smiled at her. "I can move over if you want. I won't bother you. I'm only here for the peace and quiet too."
Sora dismissively waved her hand at her. "Nonsense. Stay right where you are." She waddled to the work desk next to Shiori and plopped on to the seat with a satisfied sigh. For a moment, only the sound of the paper scroll being undone by Shiori filled the room.
"So," the medic-nin started softly, nervous to breach the subject. "I assume you've spoken to Itachi."
"Uh-huh," she replied, not taking her eyes off the scroll.
"And have you told him about your concerns regarding...what would happen to you?"
The question made her pause. She looked up at Sora in confusion. It took her a while to get what the older woman meant. And when it finally clicked, she burst out laughing, much to Sora's horror.
'She finally lost it,' the medic-nin thought.
When the giggles subsided, Shiori wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes.
"Right, about that. No. It didn't even cross my mind that time." She sighed, annoyed with herself. "Why didn't I worry about that instead, Sora-san? Why the fuck can't I worry about my impending doom first before I worry myself sick about other people?"
Sora narrowed her eyes at her. "Wait, what are you talking about? Who are they?"
Shiori continued her rant as though she didn't hear Sora at all. "Well, he sure as hell doesn't care about dying so why bother worrying about him? It's stupid. I'm stupid. People are stupid."
Angry tears forced themselves out of her and she roughly wiped them away. The more she wiped them away, the faster they came.
"I can't even stop this...this-"
"-It can't be helped, Shiori." Sora scooted her chair closer to her and grabbed both of her hands before she rubbed her face raw. "It's...how do I say this - it's what love does to people. Trust me, it's not just you. There's no shame in that."
She could think of one genius at the top of her head who had done some dangerous things in the name of love. Itachi and Shiori had more things in common than they thought.
This time, Shiori broke down. Sobs racked her entire body, making her bones shake and her breaths rattle.
"I thought I understood, Sora-san. I thought I knew what I was getting myself into...being with him."
She had made herself believe that she understood the concept of borrowed time, never once entertaining the thought of how it would destroy her in the aftermath. She had been so focused on what to do after Itachi was gone that she didn't let herself think of what she will become in the immediate aftermath. But now that losing him, truly losing him, has become a reality, she was forced to let go of the delusion and face the truth of what she had been doing during those turbulent three years. She was clinging on to the hope that she could change his mind, that if she poured her heart out to him, he would choose to be with her.
"I'm losing him, Sora-san. I'm losing him before Sasuke could even get to him. And I don't know what to do."
"Show yourself, Uzumaki Naruto."
Spotting the Kyuubi jinchuuriki had been the easy part. If Shiori was like a flare torch for sensors, Naruto was as visible as an atomic bomb going off. His Uzumaki chakra combined with that of the Kyuubi's made him almost impossible to miss and difficult to ignore. It was just Itachi and him in a secluded area of the woods located in the border of the Land of Fire. Naruto froze at the sight of him, fear evident in his round blue eyes.
"Have you come to capture me?" he asked.
"No. I merely wish to speak with you," he replied flatly. Not a split second later, two of Naruto's shadow clones appeared behind him, aiming for his back. He flung his arms up and each clone received a kunai to the heart before exploding into nothingness.
"As if I'd believe that," Naruto scoffed.
"You know you're alone. So why aren't you running?"
"My numbers can go from one to a thousand!" the blonde growled. Then he added in a lower voice, "Also, I can't afford to escape. Catching you means getting a chance to see Sasuke again."
'Sasuke huh?' the Uchiha thought. 'Guess we're on the same page.'
"Why do you care so much about my otouto? He's merely a missing-nin now."
Anger flashed across Naruto's face. "That's because I think of him as a brother more than you ever could!"
He'd be lying if he said the jinchuuriki's claim didn't hurt. Only a select few people knew that Itachi's decision to proceed with the massacre was heavily based on Sasuke's survival. He couldn't risk Konoha turning against the Uchihas first. For sure they would chase every living clan member to the ends of the Earth and eliminate them. Women and children would not be spared. Had that happened, a then eight-year-old Sasuke wouldn't have stood a chance. With the Uchihas sealing their fate by going through with the coup, he found it within himself to do the unthinkable, all for the sake of his beloved brother and for his village.
Naruto didn't know that. And he didn't plan on letting him know at all. Just as Itachi expected, the tense silence became too much to bear for the blonde. With a loud war cry, Naruto charged towards him and straight into his genjutsu. In his and Naruto's mind's eye, crows began to gather around them. Their caws rang painfully loud in the red-and-black dimension created by Itachi.
"You are already in my genjutsu," he said. "I'll tell you once more. I merely wish to talk. You've been trying to take Sasuke back to Konoha. But what if things don't go the way you want them to?"
Naruto stared back at him defiantly. "I'll do anything to make it happen!"
"Even by force? If by some turn of luck Sasuke willingly goes with you, then great. But what if the exact opposite happens?"
"...What do you mean?"
"You just said that you consider Sasuke as your brother. What if he were to attack Konoha?"
The look on Naruto's face said it all. He never considered this as a possibility. Itachi understood him. Anybody who wasn't privy to the real story behind the Uchiha clan's downfall would never think of Sasuke targeting his beloved village. It didn't make sense. He had no reason to do so.
"There's no way he'd do something like that!" the blonde roared.
"Sasuke is still naive. Anything is possible with him. In which case, can you stop him even if you have to kill him? Could you weigh Sasuke's life against Konoha in a set of scales?"
Obsidian locked on blue. What comes out of the younger shinobi's mouth next would determine whether Itachi could trust him with one of the most powerful tools he possessed: Shisui's legacy.
"I would defend Konoha! But I would also stop Sasuke without killing him."
"What you speak of are fantasies. A shinobi must be able to make difficult decisions. Harsh decisions."
Naruto paused, as though thinking about a memory from the past. Itachi could almost see the cogs and wheels of his mind working double time.
'What's it going to be, Naruto?'
"So I've been told. But you have to understand, for me there is no choice. I never go back on my word. That's my ninja way!"
Many miles away, in a bare bedroom hidden in the forest of Mount Jofuka, Uchiha Itachi opened his eyes as the information gathered by his shadow clone came back to him. He smiled to himself. The foolish kid passed the test. Now there was one more thing to do before he could finally rest.
Author's Note 2.0:This was another long chapter cut to two. For all you Itachi fans out there, you have an idea of what's coming next. It has been a long, long time but for you guys who managed to stick with me until this chapter, I would like to thank you...seriously, I can't even emphasize how thankful I am to you guys for giving me a chance to portray this version of Itachi and this alternate sort of behind-the-scenes drama of his mysterious life. Thank you for putting up with my typos (I'm a terrible beta...even to myself) and thank you for being patient enough to read through the slow bits of this story. Hope the FF bug is finally sorted and I get to hear from all of you real soon. A dream come true for me would be for all of my readers to leave a review (I'd be in cloud-nine if even half of you guys who viewed this chapter would review...what's with the silent treatment y'all?)... you think I'm low-key begging you guys for revs, don't you? You're absolutely right. Haha!
You probably notice that in this chapter (and on a lot of chapters in general), when it comes to Itachi, there's less conversation and more description of what the character is specifically doing. It's what happens when your main character isn't the most vocal character in Narutoverse. I always thought that with someone like Itachi who rarely talks in sentences, it pays to pay attention to his body language, no matter how small. After all, actions speak louder than words. Just a little trivia I guess. Hope to hear from all of you soonish.