literature

Ikachi Ch. 17

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Ikachi Ch. 17

By Sheelos-lover

…So, in case you hadn’t noticed, I’m pretty exasperated about people not posting comments.  So, please contribute to the artistic community.  Comments mean a lot to people.  I get plenty of comments on my pictures and I still feel happy when I get them!

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They would have followed Sasuke, but he went through Konoha on his way to his team’s meeting place, not the best path for missing-nin to take.  They went around the city instead.

“Hey, Sasu-chan!  I guess we still beat you, huh?”

He glared at her.

She hugged him.  “Sasuke!  Why are you so cold?”

“You killed my clan!”

“No, I didn’t!”

He tried to throw her off, but she didn’t let him.  She did let go of him, though.  Kakashi came then.

“You do realize that I could get in boatloads of trouble just for not reporting you, right?”

“Yeah, but we have someone here to meet you.”

“Really?  All I see are four Akatsuki members.”

“Three.”

“Four, unless I’m mistaken.”

“To-chan isn’t a member, he just has a cloak.”

Tobi stepped forward.  “You’re Kakashi, right?”

“Kakashi of the mirror-eye sharingan, yes.  Why?”

“I have the other one!”

“The other one?  The other what?”

Tobi pointed to his eye.  “Wait, you’re… Obito?!  Obito, is it really you?”

“I go by the name Madara.”

“That makes no sense,” Sasuke said.  “Madara Uchiha has been dead for a century.”

“He’s right,” Ikachi agreed.  “I think you’re Obito.”

“Wait,” Kakashi said.  “Take off your mask.”

“No!”  Tobi’s hands flew up to keep the other ninja from taking off his mask.

“Why not?”

“Because… because my right side…”

“You ARE Obito!  I thought you were dead!”  Kakashi hugged his former companion.  Ritonno and Seiya’s eyes went very wide, then they pulled out cameras.

“This is SO going on the fan forums!” Ritonno yelled.

“Not if I can get it on DevART first!” Seiya yelled louder.  Kakashi stopped hugging Obito.

“In exchange for not turning you in, how about I confiscate those cameras?”

“NO!” the girls yelled at once.

“A couple words with Tsunade-sama…”

“We’ve gotten in trouble with her before,” Ritonno pointed out.  “She doesn’t even know where our base is.”

“We have Obito.”

“Um… Tobi isn’t good at reading maps.  Or remembering landmarks. Tobi follows other members!”

Kakashi slapped his forehead.

“Yeah, To-chan tends to have that effect on people.”

“Wait… but, how are you not dead?  You were crushed and Rin took our one of your eyes!”

“Sasori-danna fixed me up!  And he gave me another eye, but it doesn’t work that well anymore…  My sharingan works fine, though!”

“Wow… Wait.  Sasori?  As in, Sasori of the Red Sands Sasori?”

“Yup!  He’s Ikachi-kun’s partner now!  He used to be Deidara-senpai’s, though.”

“Senpai?  So this ‘Deidara’ is…?”

“He’s always trying to get Dei-chan to teach him about art,” Seiya said.  “Usually Deidei refuses.”

“‘Deidei’…?”

“I can call him that!  I’m his girlfriend!”

“Forming relationships between S-class villains…  What’s next?”

“Sasuke admitting that Ikachi is different from Itachi and accepting her into his heart as his older sister.”

“I told you, I can never forgive that bitch!”

“Sasuke!”

“You murdered my clan!  I have to avenge them!  How much more clearly can I put it?”

“Sasuke, you… you…”  Ikachi left, angry.  Very, very angry.  Seiya followed her into the forest, keeping herself hidden.

Ikachi went to a clearing with white targets standing on a ring of trees.  Seiya watched as she jumped into the air, launched some kunai in strange directions, then threw one that started a chain reaction that sent them all into the centers of the targets.  She collected her kunai, stood considering for a second, then spun, sending the kunai in a circle to hit the targets once again.

“Sasuke…  you could have been so much…” She sat down.  “Why throw it all away to kill him?  He doesn’t even exist anymore!  Why can’t you see that?”

Seiya stepped into the clearing.  “Ikachi…”  The other girl threatened her with a kunai, then saw who it was and relaxed.

“Why did he do it, Seiya?  When he was little, we were so close…  I wanted that closeness!  I wanted to keep him near me!  …But if I had taken him with me to the Akatsuki, he probably would have been killed by them.  So he had to stay in Konoha.”

“Give him time, Ikachi.  Maybe, when he realizes that all this ‘avenger’ nonsense is useless and gets to know you as a person, then he can start to forgive you.”

“Yeah...”

“Maybe we should stay in Konoha for awhile longer.”

“Maybe… Oh, ow.  Cramps.”

“Ouch.  Let’s get back to their training ground, okay?”

“Maybe later.  Let’s just go back home for awhile, okay?”

“Home?”

“Sasuke’s house.  It was my home for most of my life, in case you’d forgotten.”

“Oh.  Okay.”  They went back to the Uchiha compound.  Just when Seiya thought that they were utterly lost, she realized that Ikachi had brought them right to the house that Sasuke still lived in.

They stayed there for about half an hour, then went back to train with Team 7.  At the end of the day, Ikachi, much to the dismay of Sasuke, invited Team 7 to come and hang out at Sasuke’s house.  They accepted.

“Remember, practice starts at nine tomorrow.  Don’t be late!”

“Kakashi-sensei, whenever we’re on time, you’re hours late.”

“Sakura has a point.  We don’t have any reason to be on time, believe it!”

“I don’t have a reason to be late.”

“I have a reason to be early,” Sasuke said.  “To get some time away from the bitch who calls herself my sister.”

“Sasuke!”

“Don’t ‘Sasuke’ me!  You killed my clan!  I can call you whatever you want!”

“Sasuke Manfred Uchiha, go to your room.”

“Manfred?” Sakura asked.

Sasuke glared at Ikachi.  “You have no right to order me around.”

“I’m older than you and your next-of-kin.  That makes me head of the clan.”

“What about mask-boy over there?”

“Tobi isn’t as strong as I am.”

“Manfred?”

“You still have no right to boss me around!”

“As leader of your clan, I command you to go to your room!”

“Manfred?”

“If I go to my room, will you get out of my life?”

“While you’re in there, yes.”

“Manfred?”

Sasuke went to his room.

“His middle name is Manfred?”

“Yeah.”

“It sounds… foreign.”

“It is.”

“How’d he end up with a stupid name like that?” the boy with the Kyuubi asked.

“Don’t insult my little brother!”

“You have to admit, though, there’s a reason he didn’t tell anyone,” Kakashi pointed out.

“Yeah… It doesn’t flow at all.”

“And it’s… Manfred.”

“Yeah…  I guess mom and dad figured that it didn’t really matter since they weren’t going to use it anyway.”

“Um… We should probably go now,” Sakura said.  “Thank you for letting us stay over for awhile.  It was nice.”

“Thanks.  I had fun, too.”

The two guys had already left.  “If you want my opinion, I think Sasuke’s actually trying to accept you.  Maybe he won’t even admit it to himself, but the last few times he met you he tried to kill you, so this has to be some sort of accomplishment.”

“Yeah…  I wish he could understand that I’m not the same person, though!”

“I’m sorry about all that…  I mean, Sasuke’s used to understanding everything.  He’s amazing!  He’s smart and good at ninjutsu and taijutsu…  Every girl in Konoha likes him.  And he’s used to being able to figure everything out.  I think he can’t comprehend that you’re not Itachi, though.  From what I’ve heard, Itachi was a heartless bastard.  You’re nice, though.  I can tell you’re really trying.  Just give Sasuke some time; I’m sure he’ll be able to accept you someday.”

“Thanks.  Sakura, right?  You’re really sweet.  Be careful on the way home.”

“I will.  Bye!”

“Bye!”

Ikachi walked to Itachi’s room.  It was exactly as he had left it: perfect.  The futon was set up perfectly, everything was in its place… There was nothing to suggest that the boy who had slept in that room, an ANBU leader, was going to kill his clan the last day he had been in that room.  Returning to it didn’t feel creepy to Ikachi, like she was in the bedroom of a killer; instead it felt comfortable.  It was her room.  She had slept in it for thirteen years.  She knew where the squeaky floorboard was, where the diary was, hidden inside of the book of law that Itachi had cut the middle out of.  The plans were all in there.  He would murder the Uchihas while Sasuke was away.  There would be no chance of killing Sasuke; he wouldn’t be anywhere near the compound.  But he had to kill them during the day or else it wouldn’t be worth it.  He wanted to stay afterward, to be Sasuke’s older brother forever, to have him as a companion for as long as Sasuke wanted.  But he knew that he couldn’t.  He couldn’t bring a nine-year-old genin to the Akatsuki any more than he could stay in Konoha unpunished.  And he was going to go to the Akatsuki.  He hated his village.  And maybe, when he ruled the world, Sasuke would come back to him.

Ikachi stopped reading.  She had forgotten the diary.  She felt the sudden urge to show Sasuke.  So she walked to his room.

“Sasuke, I have something to show you.”

“Get away from me!”

“Sasuke, I’m not going to hurt you!  I would never hurt you.”

“It’s too late.”

“There’s something that I think I need to show you.”

“Why?”

“It’s self-explanatory.”

“Then show me.”

She opened the door.  “It’s my diary.  If you read the part after the plans to kill Shisui and everyone else, that’s what I wanted to show you.”

“Where?”

“Start there.”  She tried to pull him onto her lap, like Itachi had done when he had read stories to the younger Sasuke, but he shook her off.  It was only a minor disappointment comparatively.

He finished.  “You seriously thought that would work?”

“You were young.  Young children can bend their minds to fit almost any situation.”

“You killed my parents!  You expected me to adapt?!”

“Sasuke, please don’t yell.  It wasn’t me.  It was Itachi.  He did what he thought would get rid of his troubles.  And it did.  He was pressured by the clan, father especially, and told that he was the clan’s future.  But not everyone has that potential.  Sure, he could use the sharingan at eight.  And he was chunin at ten and he was jonin at thirteen.  But he was still thirteen.  That sort of thing takes away from your life.  It haunts your consciousness until you think you’re about to burst.  And he couldn’t understand it.  He thought his problem was that he wasn’t powerful enough, so he killed Shisui to become more powerful.  Then he was even more confused.  At that point, he wanted away from it all so he killed father.  But he couldn’t just kill father; the pressure was coming from everyone around him.  But he couldn’t kill you.  You were too important to him.  But he couldn’t stay with you and he couldn’t take you with him – it wouldn’t be safe – so he joined the Akatsuki in the hopes that you would come to him after he had conquered the world.  And he was happy there.  Sure, he was talented, but he was also looked down upon because he had no experience in the real world.  And that was what he wanted.  He wanted people to say that he wasn’t the hope for the future or the strongest or the best at anything.  He wanted to be treated like a human being with faults and problems.  And that was what he got.”

“…And he left me behind to just deal with it.”

“He never meant for you to get hurt like you did, he just didn’t have any other option.”

“And you say you’re a different person.  What do you think of all this?”

“I think it was stupid.  He should have just talked to you and explained it to you and said to someone that he needed more time to sort things out for yourself.  Thirteen is a very emotional age – you’re growing and coming to terms with yourself and besides that you’ve got raging hormones.  It’s no time to be an ANBU leader.”

“I… never thought of it that way.”

“The thing is, though, because of his rank he thought of himself as an adult.  But he wasn’t.  He was a thirteen-year old.”

“Yes, but he was a thirteen-year-old who killed my family!  How do I know that you wouldn’t do the same?”

“Sasuke, our parents aren’t coming back.  Deal with it.  I miss them, too, now.  But they’re gone.  You have to face reality.  They’re dead.”

“Itachi, I don’t care if you were a guy then!  You still killed my family.  Get out of my room.”

“Give me back my diary and I’ll leave.”

“I thought you wanted me to try to understand you.”

“I do.  But it’s my diary.  If you want to look at it, we can talk in the morning.  Do you want me to make you breakfast?”

“Itachi, you’re a mass murderer.  You think I trust you to cook my food?”

“Awww, but I make good ramen!”

“Ugh!  Ramen.  That’s what that idiot Naruto eats.”

“Why don’t you try to get along with him?  I think you would be able to understand each other if you tried.”

“How?  He’s an idiot.”

“Yeah, but you’re both human.  And he grew up without parents.  He has a lot of problems, too.  It takes a strong person to be treated like he is and still appear happy.”

“I thought I told you to get out of my room.”

“I thought I told you to give me back my diary.”

He handed her Itachi’s diary and she went back to Itachi’s room, sleeping in the futon that had been his.  The one room that had been clean.

She became suddenly aware of Sasuke outside her door.  “I had to clean this place up when you left.  Every room of the compound!  It all smelled like blood!”

“You didn’t have to clean this room.  He left it perfect.”

“Why did you do that?  To mock me?”  He opened the door and stepped inside.

“Sasuke, you have to understand!  I’m not Itachi anymore.  I’m different.”

“That’s what you say.”

“I am!”

“On the outside, maybe.  But, part of you is still the same.”

She knew it was true.  But, it wasn’t the part that he thought it was.  It wasn’t the part that murdered people.  It was the personality.  It was different, too, though, the part of her that had been least influenced by the gender change.

“You’re right.  But… You’re wrong, too.”

“How am I wrong?  You’re still a murderer!  You still have that ring and that cloak!  And you look just the same.”

“Sasuke!”  Her left hand flew to her chest.  She felt offended.

“Well, you don’t look the same there, but your face…  It’s… Something about the expression is just the same as before.  There’s something you’re not telling me!  There’s always something you’re hiding from me!”

“Sasuke… There are a lot of things that you’d rather not know.”

“Yeah, like that my family was killed by you.  But guess what?  I know it!”

“Sasuke… Do you really thing you want to know?”

“Yes.”

“Then… I’ll tell you.  I was raped.  By Orochimaru.”

“What?”

“Yes.  And, until yesterday I thought I was pregnant.  But I’m not.”

“Orochimaru…?”

“Yeah.  Sasori-kun went out to kill him, and I followed him with Kisame and Zetsu.  I was afraid of men, especially Orochimaru, so when we got to him, I broke down.  Everything went blurry…  I don’t know how to describe it.  It was the ultimate terror.  It was scarier than when you came home and no one was there.”

“But… he IS dead, right?”

“Oh, that’s so sweet, Sasuke!  You care!”

“Not about you.”

“Oh…  Yeah, Orochimaru’s dead.  I can show you the ashes if you want.”

“It’s okay.”

“You look sad.  Is something wrong?”

“What?  No!  Nothing’s wrong!”

“Really?  You seem sort of… tense.”

“Well… Now that he’s dead… What happens to my curse mark?”

“I… don’t know.  I believe in you, though, Sasuke.  I think you’ll be able to conquer it.  Maybe you should talk to Anko, the woman who did the second round of the Chunin exams!  She has a curse mark, too!”

“She does?”

“Yeah!  I almost did, but I was too fast for Oro, since I always used my sharingan back then.”

“Well, you mastered it when you were eight.”

“Yeah…  That’s when this whole thing started.  They thought, if I could master the Sharingan at eight and become a powerful ninja, I could take the chunin exams when I was ten.  And if I could be a chunin at ten, I could be a jonin at thirteen.  But the strength isn’t the point.  And neither is the intelligence.  Itachi’s mind couldn’t deal with the pressure.”

“Why do we always get back to…?”

“I’m sorry.  But, please, Sasuke.  Please say you’ll forgive me, just a little bit.”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“You could have denied it!  You could have told them you weren’t ready!  You could have –”

“He didn’t know what was wrong!  He didn’t understand!  He only knew that something didn’t feel right.  He just thought that he didn’t have enough power, not that a thirteen-year-old shouldn’t have that much responsibility!  What would you have done?”

“I’m thirteen.  Obviously I’m not going to be a jonin anytime soon.”

“Sasu-chan… Why are you so mad at me?  It was Itachi, not me.”

“I… My place is that of an avenger.  You murdered my clan.  No matter how much you beg forgiveness, there’s only one way to avenge them.”

“So… You still want to kill me.”

“Yes.”

“Okay.  I’ll leave tomorrow.”

“Thank you.”

“Thank you for listening, though, Sasuke.  It meant a lot.”

“I didn’t have anything better to do.”  He left.  She knew that he wouldn’t kill her in her sleep; he would only disappoint himself.

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We always think of Itachi as the man who killed the Uchiha clan.  But he was just a kid.  He was thirteen!  I think it’s hard to process how young he really was because he was so powerful.  But, if you look into the psychology of it and the likelihood that he had taken several lives even before Shisui (his best friend) then the massacre actually makes perfect sense…
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MABFRED!!!WTF lol thats so funny when i heard i was like MANFRED wat the bleep so funny