damned_institute | Day 41: Sun Room

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Day 41: Sun Room

Haseo's steps were heavy with the weight of righteous anger as he was escorted into the Sun Room, his posture so sullen and reluctant you could almost hear the nostalgic cry of an electric guitar. He was seething, and though perhaps it was a bit harder to be intimidating while wearing the uniform of an insane asylum and flanked by a bored-looking orderly, it was not for lack of trying.

Unfortunately, his nurse seemed unaffected by the act, and even with the cloud of failing to keep "Kai" away from "Peyton" hanging over her, remained determinedly cheerful. She merely said something about receiving a lecture later on, ignored his retorts, and assured him that it would be alright even though his internet stalker was in the same building. For the most part, Haseo tuned her babbling out after that, dismissing it as hopeless.

"...and usually this would be the time children would be taking showers, but you don't have to worry about that right now. Now then, le--"

"Wait. What?"

"Oh, all the children seventeen or under are separated right now while the adults go to the courtyard..."

"Hey, I'm not a kid you old--!"

"Oh of course you aren't dear, but you're not eighteen yet either, now are you?"

Haseo resisted the urge to do something rash, literally biting his tongue to keep quiet. But upon having the bulletin board pointed out to him, he shrugged off his anger for the most part and headed that way, fully intending to get more answers than he'd had time to receive during breakfast.

Well... at least Endrance is in another shower group, he thought, Thank god.

[Closed to Tsukasa, for now!]

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"Has he?" Kakashi could almost have kicked himself for not talking to Sasuke sooner. Maybe some part of him had just expected the Uchiha not to stay put long enough for Naruto to get the words out, but it wasn't exactly a shock that he'd gone to Sasuke first. Oh well; it wasn't like Kakashi could take away what the kid had learned. And while he would hope that news of his death would affect Sasuke (meaning he hadn't been able to get rid of those pesky bonds after all), Kakashi doubted that he'd be this visibly shaken up over it.

Either way, he'd meant what he said about keeping things bottled up. Even Kakashi had a confidant of sorts, and he was starting to learn just how important those daily chats were, now that he couldn't exactly have them.

"Well, that saves some talking, I suppose. But I wanted to see how you were doing. You didn't exactly look well at breakfast, or now." As much as he might protest it or say it was none of his business, Sasuke had been Kakashi's student. Even beyond keeping care of the others, Kakashi also had a connection with Sasuke. It didn't exactly please him to see his former pupil in such a state.

Kakashi sounded like he hadn't expected Sasuke to have known already. That probably made sense, given the fact that (now that Sasuke thought about it) it was potentially sensitive information that Naruto had blurted out this morning. And in a situation like this, Sasuke had hardly expected Naruto to decide that informing him was a priority -- though it seemed that keeping him up-to-date on the death roster seemed to be a growing fad.

... as was asking him how he was. As if there was an answer that Sasuke could possibly provide: because the fact remained that this should have been a triumph. He'd killed the man who had betrayed the clan, had learned the truth about the massacre, had learned the name of the person who had been Itachi's accomplice.

He'd killed the brother who had betrayed him.

And they wanted to know how he was -- the urge to snap what concern is it of yours? was strong, but if even Naruto could think of playing the card of alliance, Kakashi definitely could. Why could none of them just --

"I'm able to function." It was the truth. It was part of the truth that was wrong, because after fighting Itachi it should have been hard to move, let alone stand and walk, and Sasuke still couldn't make sense of it. Maybe if he could just -- find silence enough to think. Think and not remember.

"What else do you want to know?"

Able to function, but maybe not so well as he thought he could; the lack of protective anger didn't exactly slip by Kakashi's notice. Whatever had happened to Sasuke, it seemed like it'd left him emotionally exhausted. Instead of his usually rude manner, Sasuke was actually cooperating. The jounin suspected it had less to do with a change of heart, and more about hoping Kakashi would get whatever it was he wanted and leave all the quicker.

Definitely not the Uchiha's usual manner. So just what had happened.

"I haven't seen Itachi around much lately." The list of things that could successfully get to Sasuke was short, and Kakashi knew his brother was on the top. He didn't exactly like asking in such a roundabout way, given the circumstances; Kakashi wasn't the sort who necessarily enjoyed making someone's pain worse without extremely good reason. But even in his current state, Sasuke would likely take advantage of any slip Kakashi made, so he had to keep his statements vague enough for the Uchiha to fill in his own blanks. Even if he didn't say the words, Kakashi wasn't going to miss any reaction Sasuke made, however small. If it had something to do with Itachi, or nothing at all, he'd find out about it now.

"Have you?"

-- and Kakashi hit the nail on the head in the first try. There was no possibility that this was an idle question. For all his apparent sloppiness, Kakashi was an elite shinobi, and the things he did and said had methods and purposes. Kakashi had guessed that something had happened with Itachi, though whether he had extrapolated precisely what that had been was yet unclear.

That the man could guess so easily was -- not just irritating (was Sasuke truly so easily read, and had the years really created so little distance?), but a sign of precisely how much of the confusion of his reaction Sasuke had allowed to show.

If Kakashi figured it out ... the rest of the Konoha-nin would as well, either through their own conjecture or by being told by the more intelligent amongst them. There was no point trying to hide it, and --

And it should have been something of pride. Sasuke had avenged the clan.

But when he answered the question, his voice was devoid of anything resembling pride, almost more tired than anything else: as if he'd walked years only to discover that the end of the road had been a lie.

"I met him last night," nothing more than the barest of facts, because more than that led into territory Sasuke was -- not remotely willing to discuss. "I killed him."

This was the second time Kakashi had heard of Itachi's death at Sasuke's hand, though it was just as shocking as the first. Of course, the two instances where completely separate, so that added to the surprise. But despite coming from a time where Sasuke had already murdered his brother, Kakashi was indeed just as stunned to hear the words come from the boy directly.

Well, if nothing else, it did explain everything.

"Oh Sasuke." Kakashi's words came out in a sigh, a quiet mix of pity and understanding. Maybe it would be simpler to just say 'I told you so,' because Kakashi had, over three years ago when he tied Sasuke to a tree. But that wasn't what he needed right now, and thankfully, the jounin wasn't petty enough to say it anyway. So instead he left it at that softly uttered phrase, hoping that maybe Sasuke would latch onto it and let out some of the emotion he feeling. Kakashi didn't mind be screamed at, or having the Uchiha's anger directed at him. But if something didn't change, Sasuke would only start to deteriorate, like so many ninja before him who had devoted themselves to revenge, and found the end unsatisfying.

It was something about the tone. Something about the way Kakashi said it as if he understood, as if he could possibly understand the -- the wrongness of it, the wrongness not only of the way Itachi had died so easily but of the nothingness that had come afterward. Even with Madara's name in place and even with this place to escape.

Something about remembering, years ago, the same voice telling him of this. Telling him (you and I have found good companions) that there was another path.

But there had never been another path. Believing in it, for however brief a time, had been a lie. In the end there was only Itachi and the promise of blood in the Uchiha eyes, the fate of a failure who had been unable to avenge his clan not once but multiple times, the fate of a coward who had run on the night of his parents' death. An Uchiha's path was Uchiha alone, the weight of the name as inescapable as it was unsharable; the clan above all. Companions were weights when Sasuke couldn't afford to care for any life but his own, because his own was sworn to destroy one thing. Konohagakure had left few paths to growth, and Naruto and Sakura didn't deserve the taint of vengeance in their lives.

But for a moment Sasuke had nearly believed that it was possible to step outside of Uchiha, to allow himself to be anything more than vengeance. To let Sasuke stand for anything more than that -- and Kakashi had been the one who'd first told the lie.

And though there were reasons to be grateful for it, at the moment Sasuke could find nothing but fury: because this should have been a moment of victory and he couldn't find anything but something closer to a shade of regret.

"What the hell do you know?!" He shouted, shooting to his feet fast enough to shove the chair he'd been sitting in back a few feet. Fists clenched, voice demanding -- "I don't need your fucking pity! You talk like you know everything, but when have you ever stepped outside the easy path?! What do you know of betrayal?!"

There it was. Sasuke was showing something, and Kakashi believed that was the key to getting him to actually vent what he was feeling. Keeping everything bottled up inside without actually working through it would only corrupt Sasuke further. Maybe now there might be actually be a chance to reach him in some significant way, to turn him back onto the right path. Because unlike Sasuke, Kakashi believed that it was possible for Sasuke to still change his life.

He was still alive, after all.

So he met Sasuke's anger without flinching, glad that the Uchiha hadn't actually punched him yet. The nurses rushing over wouldn't exactly give them much of an opportunity to talk. Once again Sasuke was claiming to be a unique existence, and Kakashi couldn't say he wasn't. But it also wasn't true that the jounin himself hadn't gone through something similar.

"Maybe not the same things you do, I'll admit." Kakashi's voice was as steady and calm as his stance. No Sasuke, he wasn't going to back away, and he wasn't going to be afraid, or doubtful. "But a long time ago, I betrayed my comrades to the rules of the shinobi. I thought straying away from that path was something unforgivable, so I turned my back when one of them was taken by the enemy in order to finish my mission. I abandoned my team for the principles I thought were absolute and inescapable. Maybe it's not exactly the same, but I don't think it's entirely different either."

Kakashi crossed his arms over his chest, though that didn't mean he wasn't still carefully watching Sasuke's move. He knew very well that at any moment, the boy just might try to take that swing at him, though maybe he'd at least hold off long enough to let Kakashi finish. This was more about his past than he'd told anyone in a long time, and he wasn't just saying it for the random nostalgia. "You devoted yourself to revenge, and I devoted myself to following the rules. Your clan was killed by a traitor--and my father killed himself because he abandoned a mission to save his team, and he was dishonored for it by the entire village. Including the same people he saved. I've lived a long time, Sasuke. So maybe it's possible that I know more than you think I do."

It was like throwing handfuls of dirt at a rock wall. Sasuke had forgotten how futile it always felt to be angry at Kakashi -- the man was imperturbable. It was impossible to recall even a single instance when Sasuke had actually seen Kakashi lose his cool, even in the face of indubitable danger like Zabuza or the inarguably bizarre like Gai. And while Sasuke had found it infuriating but appreciated it as a student, he could only find it infuriating now --

Right up until that calm voice admitted to betraying his comrades in the past. Sasuke had thought that, given all the rhetoric about comrades and teamwork that Kakashi had given them (and that he assumed Jiraiya was still feeding to Naruto, if the idiot's refusal to give up was any indication), it was simply some kind of taught tradition in the lineage of teachers and students Kakashi belonged to. It hadn't occurred to him that Kakashi might have been different at some point.

Actually, if he thought about it, he had never even considered much of what Kakashi's life might have been like beyond his role as the leader of Team 7. But of course, he must have had a team once. That he had abandoned them for a path he had thought was necessary to walk -- was a surprise. That his father had killed himself was another. Sasuke had heard of the White Fang, as most shinobi of the current era had, and he'd certainly known who Kakashi's father was, but ...

"It's -- not the same," he said after a moment, but his voice was lower, tenser, his posture shifting to something more defensive. "I left because I was too weak not to. I did what I had to in order to reach my goals and complete my duty, but they didn't need to do any of that." There was no point in bothering to clarify who they were. "I had no right to ask that of them -- I didn't want them with me anyway."

Because Kakashi was right in that the path of revenge was a difficult one, and not one that anyone who lacked reason needed to walk -- and perhaps this was the closest to admitting that Sasuke had even cared to think about Naruto and Sakura when he'd left. At the Valley of the End he'd nearly stayed, nearly given in to the illusion of being able to create a family out of ashes and let himself live for what he had admitted were truly precious companions.

"When my brother left me alive, I swore on the blood of my clan to kill him," Sasuke said, and no longer knew if he wanted to prove Kakashi didn't really understand or if he simply wanted him to. "Whatever they were, Naruto and Sakura aren't my blood. I was never supposed to have anything more than my revenge -- they were never supposed to be part of my path, and I never should have let them. That was my mistake. I thought I could correct that by leaving."

They didn't deserve what being Uchiha meant. (For generations, the Uchiha have killed their best friends and their brothers.) There was something almost pleading in Sasuke's voice when he continued -- "I didn't leave them to die. I left them to live. My path ends in --"

This.

Something that was supposed to be different from this. Something completely different, but -- in the life he lived Sasuke had no room for regret, couldn't afford it, couldn't let himself even begin to consider it. That much he still knew. His team was a past and Itachi had been his present: what there was now was what he didn't know.

"And I so did I." Kakashi knew it wasn't exactly the same, because really, how could any two people ever live the same life? But there was enough overlap in what Sasuke said and what he'd done to his own past that Kakashi could understand. He just had to make his former student see it. "I was so afraid of being called trash by the shinobi that I swore to uphold their laws no matter what. So I did what I had to in order to complete the mission, and I abandoned one teammate to the enemy, and the other who wanted to save her. So in its own twisted way, Sasuke, you were less cruel to them than I was to my own teammates--my friends."

Kakashi kept his voice even only through practice; he honestly believed every word he spoke just then. The crime he'd committed on that day was one he hadn't been able to forgive himself for, even a lifetime later. When he was dying, his last thoughts had been apologies to those people he'd been too weak to protect.

"You didn't leave your comrades to die, but I did. And even after I went back, my best friend still died." Kakashi smiled briefly then, from behind his mask, but there was nothing joyful in his grin. "But I learned from those people. So long as we're still alive, we can still change our paths, and we can still look towards the future. You've gotten your revenge, but are you satisfied with it, Sasuke? What are you going to do now, that you've fulfilled the purpose you devoted yourself to? Because your life isn't over yet, and that means that neither is your path."

He paused them, almost as if he were going to give Sasuke time to answer. There was still a last thing to remind him of though. "Oh, and one more thing. We're both lucky, Sasuke. We both found precious people who never gave up on us. Uchiha Obito believed in me enough to give up his life for mine, and to entrust me with this sharingan. And I think you know that Naruto and Sakura still believe in you. Whether or not you consider it a mistake, that's the truth, even after you left."

More surprises. For a moment there was a retort almost on the tip of Sasuke's tongue, you didn't have to fight your way into a new path in order to avoid killing your best friend yourself, but he managed to swallow it barely in time. That was too much for an outsider to know, even if Kakashi had an Uchiha eye, even if he'd once had an Uchiha student --

Even if he'd once had an Uchiha for a best friend. That explained the eye. Of course, Sasuke had wondered, but ...

It was too eerily reminiscent of Itachi's words. The taking and retaking of life and blood and sight. What would Kakashi think if he learned that the way in which he'd received the mirror-wheel was perhaps not as unique as it might have seemed? And would it change his perspective at all to know that it was this precise tradition, the lifeblood of a best friend and the eyes of a brother, that meant that Sasuke's duty was unfinished? Somewhere in their own world was an enigma that had lived for years after blinding his own brother, and as long as both that man and Sasuke were alive, Sasuke had no other path to walk.

But that was far too much to explain right now, and Kakashi was still telling the same lie he'd told all those years ago.

"My path belongs to Uchiha," Sasuke said after a long pause, but the words were heavy. "That is where it began and that is where it will end. The most I can do now is choose how I will walk it."

His past and his future. Itachi had seen to both. And Naruto and Sakura, for all their misguided and foolish hope, couldn't change that -- shouldn't have had to have a part in it anyway. Naruto had spoken of wanting revenge at breakfast and obviously lacked any idea of what revenge entailed. Both of them were still too naive to really be shinobi, let alone to even try to take up the mantle of vengeance. Kakashi should have been helping them learn that, damn it, not trying to encourage their ridiculousness --

But Sasuke was too tired now to call the man out on it. There was another pause while he tried to work up a suitable explanation for why Itachi's death didn't mean he could take another try at that beautifully impossible world Kakashi kept dangling in front of him, but he couldn't work his mind around the right kind of words and the right kind of tone. And in the end he sat again, sinking into the chair as if pressed down by an invisible force, exhaling a slow, exhausted breath.

"What do you want from me?" Maybe, if Sasuke was really lucky, Kakashi really did have an agenda here, and if Sasuke could just appease it, both man and lies (regrets, but Sasuke refused to have those) would go.

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Day 41: Sun Room

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