000

Sasuke has three things that no one is allowed to touch but him.

Itachi, who is his kill. No one else has the right.

Naruto, who is his rival, is his best friend. Who would be, if he allowed himself to think the words, his equal.

Sakura, who is simply his, since the day that Iruka-sensei announced that they were on the same team and she shrieked ?Sasuke-kun!? with such delight.

Itachi has been his since the day everything died.

Naruto has been his since not much after that, when he first realized that they might be alike.

Sakura has been his in word since she first made it clear that she loved him, in the same way all the other girls loved him, which was stupidly. She's been his in deed since he found her, only her, waiting for him on the bridge before he left for Sound.

She asked to go with him.

He would never do that to her. But, for just a moment, he was tempted. Then he killed it, because avengers can only have room in their hearts for one thing, and Sasuke's one thing will be Itachi until he watches his brother's chest rise and fall for the last time.

Konoha tempted him too much. Not when he was nine and ten, and too numb to do anything but train. Not when he was eleven, and full of contempt for everyone who was less than himself.

But when Sasuke turned twelve, things changed. There was Iruka-sensei, who showed him that blank, smiling concern that he'd gotten from all the adults since his clan was massacred. But Iruka-sensei's blank, smiling concern was only on the top, and Sasuke thinks that he has always been good at seeing underneath the underneath.

Inside of Iruka-sensei there is this constantly bleeding wound, this desire and obsession with helping everyone who passes him, of keeping the village's children safe.

Konoha is a hidden village, after all. Iruka-sensei will never lack children who are hurt and alone. But he'll never be able to save them, not all of them.

Some, like Sasuke, make it perfectly clear that they have no desire to be saved. None whatsoever. At all.

And he wasn't hurt when eventually Iruka-sensei got the picture and backed off.

There was Kakashi-sensei, who is the third person alive to have any trace of Uchiha blood in his veins. It's stolen blood, yes. Only what came with the eye. But it's there.

Besides Itachi, Kakashi-sensei is all that Sasuke has left of his clan.

One eye.

Kakashi-sensei, like most ninja, is probably certifiably insane. But sometimes, late at night, during missions, when Sasuke was sitting watch, just far enough away from the others to be alone, sometimes Kakashi would come and sit not too far from him, just close enough to make Sasuke not alone, and it was like having an Uchiha ghost there to keep him company.

The problem with Sasuke's clan is that they're all ghosts, and sometimes he wants to touch someone who's still alive.

He'll touch Itachi, of course. He'll squeeze his fingers around Itachi's throat until it squishes, until he feels bones shift and crack under his grip.

(Like the way Itachi broke his wrist during their last encounter. Exactly like that. Except with Itachi's neck.)

There was Sakura, the millionth stupid girl to make him a bento box with a sugary note inside. Sakura, with her amazing chakra control but weak chakra supply, with her petty childish vanity and surprising womanly strength.

It's not the kind of strength that allows her to hit things well, or anything useful. That other strength. The one she used to use to calm he and Naruto down, to force Kakashi-sensei to step in, to make Naruto silent and ashamed, to make himself wish he were far away.

Sakura is possibly the only ninja he knows who is certifiably sane.

She loves him.

If Sasuke had not made his heart so small, there might even have been something he could have done about that.

Finally, of course, there was Naruto.

Uzumaki Naruto.

All the careful insults that Sasuke whispered, all the carefully timed entrances to show Naruto up, everything he did calculated to make sure that Naruto would always hate him.

And then he had to go and fuck things up by saving Naruto when it counted.

He knew it was different on the bridge. With Haku.

Sasuke isn't the kind of boy to learn and remember his opponent's names, but he remembers Haku.

Sasuke's also not the kind of boy to see himself in other people's eyes. So what if Haku lived and died blindly devoted to one man?

Sasuke's devoted his life to a man in a rather different fashion, after all.

He knew it was different on the bridge.

Because on that bridge, just for a second, Sasuke gave up Itachi. For possibly the first time in his life. He existed, in that single moment, purely to take down Haku and to protect Naruto.

No Itachi whatsoever.

Just for a minute.

So it's Naruto's fault, really. If Konoha hadn't tempted him so much, Sasuke never would have had to leave.

If Iruka-sensei had just stopped giving him that look when they passed in the street.

If Kakashi-sensei had had an eye from any other clan in Konoha. If he hadn't always known exactly when to let Sasuke be and when to tie Sasuke to a tree and make him listen.

If Sakura had been as shallow and witless as she'd first appeared, instead of so goddamn right about so many things. If she'd just been chasing his pretty face, and not come to love him in that way that he never wanted to be loved again.

If Naruto hadn't been able to get under his skin like that. If Naruto had just shut the fuck up. If Naruto had admitted to being second-best. If Naruto had been able to watch his own damn back instead of messing up all the time. If Naruto hadn't kept showing Sasuke up every time it mattered.

If Naruto hadn't kept acting like they were goddamn friends instead of enemies.

If Sasuke hadn't needed that friendship quite so badly.

But Itachi killed that, too. Because there was a damn good reason that Sasuke no longer allowed himself the luxury of friends, and it wasn't just healthy paranoia.

If Itachi hadn't been so perfect with the mangenkyou sharingen.

If it hadn't hurt so much.

If the death of his clan had ever just stopped hurting.

It wasn't just the temptation that Konoha offered. It was the memories.

Sasuke is so sick of living his life for ghosts. Ghosts who remind him that Iruka-sensei is a crap shinobi who works with children because he's incompetent on missions. Who remind him that everyone Kakashi cares about is dead, and that there are reasons for that. Who remind him that Sakura loves him because all the other girls love him, and girls only compete about stupid things like boys. Who remind him that Naruto is dead-last, is completely without talent, is better than Sasuke.

Ghosts who remind him that no matter what kind of moronic jackass Naruto may be, he doesn't deserve to die just so that Sasuke can possess the mangenkyou sharingnen.

Ghosts who list their names over and over, and how they died, and in what order, and who died quickly and painlessly and who lingered. Ghosts who whisper Itachi's name over and over into Sasuke's ear, until whenever the wind blows that name is all he hears.

Itachi. Itachi. Itachi. Sasuke, you owe us Itachi.

Sasuke likes to think that, some day, he'll go back to Konoha. That Iruka-sensei will still be a teacher. That Kakashi-sensei will still show up to even the most urgent meetings three hours late. That Sakura will still blush when he meets her eyes. That Naruto will still smell like ramen and threaten impotently to kick his ass.

If he's honest, if he looks underneath the underneath, Sasuke knows that there is no such thing as coming back. Itachi is too big, too strong, and knows his little brother all too well.

The best that he can hope for is double suicide.

Sasuke is going to die, but he's going to take Itachi with him, and then if there's any justice at all Kakashi will pluck out his eye and burn it, so that there's nothing left of the Uchiha clan at all.

Sasuke's only wish, the wish he doesn't want to make because his heart should be too small, is for Naruto and Sakura. He wants them to know, before he dies. That they're his.

That if he'd been any other boy with any other life, they'd have been enough. They'd have outweighed Itachi.

Sasuke's bastard, traitorous heart wishes that they'd been able to save him.

000

End

000

August 5, 2005

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