[ The cold, analytical dissection of his question further aggravates Stiles, who reasons bitingly, It’ll change how I feel about you. For once, he keeps the thought to himself, but only because it seems Itachi is willing to answer him regardless. Being reminded of the shinobi’s appallingly young age at the time only makes the described situation all the more ludicrous. A thirteen year old slaughtering everyone in his extended family in the hopes of preventing more bloodshed. It’s insane. What does it mean that a child, barely a teenager, made such a decision? That Itachi was capable of carrying such a decision out in the first place? “Perhaps someone so young shouldn’t possess the power I did…” Jesus Christ. ]
I’m thinking, [ he says defensively, feeling that look like a brand on the side of his face. But in reality, his mind is caught in the undertow of his dogged loyalty to a friend who loves this man while Stiles himself struggles against the current out of a sense of duty to his own ideals. ] Was peace really worth it? Wasn’t your family worth fighting for? There’s…there’s no justice.
[ And he’s not naïve; he understands intimately that the best solutions don’t always end with justice, with the bad guys losing and the good guys winning. Yet Stiles – for whom friends and family are the most critical, influential factor in every action he takes – cannot fathom a world where he would ever consider the choice Itachi made. It’s impossible. ]
Why did you leave Sasuke alive? [ asks Stiles desperately, searching for some common ground, some means by which he can understand this increasingly alien man. ]
[Fallen to waiting, Itachi remains statuesque on the dock; it would be fair to say he has not moved more than his head and his eyes since this conversation began. Another way of exacting control over himself—if only in a physical sense, yet the physical more easily translates into mental and emotional.
He's anticipated that question. All of them, but particularly the last, the only one he chooses to fasten his attention onto. It bears the heaviest burden, after all. Was peace worth it? Yes. Could he have chosen his family? Not if he knew it would lead them to slaughtering others, a constant power struggle between clan and clan, clan and village, village and village...
But this one. It has the most difficult, the most complex, the most simple answer—]
I couldn't kill him.
[Perhaps an unbelievable answer for someone willing to slaughter innocent men, women, and children. But Sasuke—he couldn't. Never. Itachi's voice drifts low and careful, though it remains still solid and certain.]
It was my only condition when I agreed to the parameters of the mission.
tags this mid-composing tag bomb because i'm too excited to wait
[ Given the complexity of the choice that Itachi has just described to him, it’s almost offensively inconceivable to hear such a simple answer now. Visibly balking, Stiles turns to fully face the other man, staring at him in incredulous disbelief. As Itachi anticipated, the teen doesn’t buy it initially; it doesn’t help that he’s watched the two interact in person before, where both Uchiha came off more like estranged, distant family members than beloved brothers incapable of killing each other. ]
What a joke. [ An angry scoff of breath, Stiles beginning to pace up and down the dock. ] What a joke! It’s so fucking funny, I don’t even need to wait for the punchline. You took it upon yourself to decide peace for the village meant slaughtering god knows how many people so they couldn’t rise up against the very real injustices leveled against them, but then left your little brother alive because you “couldn’t” do it. You’re exiled, and he spends until –
[ Stiles pauses, eyes narrowing, as he does math rapidly in his head – calculating ages and time. ]
Until two years ago. Until two freakin’ years ago, like ten years. Hating you! And I know he did, I saw a memory of it. All because you apparently “couldn’t” tell him the truth either. Probably on some bullshit to “protect” him, right?
[ Jaw tight, he thinks back to the first memory he saw in Sasuke’s mirror – of Sasuke’s panic attack amidst a litany of increasingly frantic denials about his brother’s intentions. ]
I can’t wrap my head around this. What…what was life even like for him, growing up? Jesus fucking Christ, Itachi!
[Through that emotional veil of anger, Itachi's mind snaps up the most important flag of information. The very real injustices leveled against them—so he doesn't understand. It's disappointing, of course. Yet it isn't as though Itachi expected him to, when the contentious and politically rife relationship between the Uchiha clan and the village of Konoha could not easily be distilled into a single conversation. Perhaps it was a failure of communication on his own part. Perhaps he should have clarified what he witnessed, the abuses of power, the egos, the scheming...
Even then, Konoha is not without fault. This he recognizes as well. But Konoha is an entity made up of numerous parts, including many other clans outside the Uchiha. No single clan is more important than the rest. There's a complexity that simply cannot be shared in a few words without the experience of living it—calling it home.
So he focuses, as Stiles does, on Sasuke.]
It wasn't only about his protection. I willingly accepted the fault to shield Konoha most of all. If the truth of what occurred was known, it would reflect badly upon the village and encourage further strife and violence. Only a few people were aware of my actions. Sasuke couldn't know, for that reason as well.
[This he used as blackmail to keep his brother safe, but that's another story...]
He survived. In our world, that isn't something to take for granted. That was my goal. [He stares so long at one point in the distance it begins to blur, to lose detail.] I understand more than you do that I do not deserve a relationship with Sasuke. I'm abiding his desires for one here because it's as much as I owe. He has others who care about him now, including yourself. I'd rather see him concentrate on that.
[ Dock boards creaking under his shifting weight, he stares openly at Itachi – scrutinizing the flat expression and deadened gaze for everything the shinobi may not be saying aloud. In the end, with the only recipient of his rage allowing the emotion to break on him without protest, his anger dissipates as quickly as it was stoked; Stiles feels exhausted, like he’s waking from a nasty, debilitating panic attack. This is a conversation he knows he’ll obsess over for nights to come, picking apart everything he was told again and again in an attempt to make sense of the chaos of it all. A thirteen year old slaughtering his entire clan for the greater good, but sparing his younger brother out of sentimentality. It’s just so surreal. ]
You do owe him that. But that shouldn’t be the reason you interact with him. So, I guess I only have one last question.
[ His voice is as tired as he is. In spite of the older man’s seemingly composed demeanor, Stiles has no doubt that the discussion has weighed even more heavily on Itachi. ]
You do love him…right?
[ Ultimately, this is all that matters. It’s the single most important takeaway. It decides how Stiles interacts with this man from now on. ]
[This isn't the question he wanted to answer, but maybe it's the inevitable one hanging heavy and dark over the course of their conversation. Always Sasuke, in the end.
It's not even a question which requires him to consider his answer before he gives it. The truth is plain, surely Stiles can see from everything he's said. But perhaps not. He's spent so many years pretending Sasuke was nothing more to him than a measure of power that to put voice to the opposite, the real and hidden wound within himself...]
I do. There's nothing that would ever change that.
[It's spoken in the quietest, almost hesitant tone he's used yet. They've reached the limit of vulnerability and truth Itachi is willing to surrender in this interaction. He turns, beginning the walk back up the dock and toward the city, leaving Stiles behind.]
[ Maybe he shouldn’t believe him. Maybe he shouldn’t take the word of a man who, at thirteen, massacred his entire extended family to allegedly keep the peace. Maybe he shouldn’t trust that Itachi is telling the truth about his reasoning for keeping Sasuke alive. After all, is someone like this even capable of love? And yet, Stiles does believe – has always had a knack for that, if nothing else, when no one else would listen. So, he watches Itachi’s retreating back with an odd, sharp pain beginning to throb in his chest, a kind of profane sympathy he didn’t ask for or want, especially not for this person.
Long after Itachi disappears from sight, Stiles lingers at the docks in the Underground, mind turning, turning, turning. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
I’m thinking, [ he says defensively, feeling that look like a brand on the side of his face. But in reality, his mind is caught in the undertow of his dogged loyalty to a friend who loves this man while Stiles himself struggles against the current out of a sense of duty to his own ideals. ] Was peace really worth it? Wasn’t your family worth fighting for? There’s…there’s no justice.
[ And he’s not naïve; he understands intimately that the best solutions don’t always end with justice, with the bad guys losing and the good guys winning. Yet Stiles – for whom friends and family are the most critical, influential factor in every action he takes – cannot fathom a world where he would ever consider the choice Itachi made. It’s impossible. ]
Why did you leave Sasuke alive? [ asks Stiles desperately, searching for some common ground, some means by which he can understand this increasingly alien man. ]
no subject
He's anticipated that question. All of them, but particularly the last, the only one he chooses to fasten his attention onto. It bears the heaviest burden, after all. Was peace worth it? Yes. Could he have chosen his family? Not if he knew it would lead them to slaughtering others, a constant power struggle between clan and clan, clan and village, village and village...
But this one. It has the most difficult, the most complex, the most simple answer—]
I couldn't kill him.
[Perhaps an unbelievable answer for someone willing to slaughter innocent men, women, and children. But Sasuke—he couldn't. Never. Itachi's voice drifts low and careful, though it remains still solid and certain.]
It was my only condition when I agreed to the parameters of the mission.
tags this mid-composing tag bomb because i'm too excited to wait
What a joke. [ An angry scoff of breath, Stiles beginning to pace up and down the dock. ] What a joke! It’s so fucking funny, I don’t even need to wait for the punchline. You took it upon yourself to decide peace for the village meant slaughtering god knows how many people so they couldn’t rise up against the very real injustices leveled against them, but then left your little brother alive because you “couldn’t” do it. You’re exiled, and he spends until –
[ Stiles pauses, eyes narrowing, as he does math rapidly in his head – calculating ages and time. ]
Until two years ago. Until two freakin’ years ago, like ten years. Hating you! And I know he did, I saw a memory of it. All because you apparently “couldn’t” tell him the truth either. Probably on some bullshit to “protect” him, right?
[ Jaw tight, he thinks back to the first memory he saw in Sasuke’s mirror – of Sasuke’s panic attack amidst a litany of increasingly frantic denials about his brother’s intentions. ]
I can’t wrap my head around this. What…what was life even like for him, growing up? Jesus fucking Christ, Itachi!
same......
Even then, Konoha is not without fault. This he recognizes as well. But Konoha is an entity made up of numerous parts, including many other clans outside the Uchiha. No single clan is more important than the rest. There's a complexity that simply cannot be shared in a few words without the experience of living it—calling it home.
So he focuses, as Stiles does, on Sasuke.]
It wasn't only about his protection. I willingly accepted the fault to shield Konoha most of all. If the truth of what occurred was known, it would reflect badly upon the village and encourage further strife and violence. Only a few people were aware of my actions. Sasuke couldn't know, for that reason as well.
[This he used as blackmail to keep his brother safe, but that's another story...]
He survived. In our world, that isn't something to take for granted. That was my goal. [He stares so long at one point in the distance it begins to blur, to lose detail.] I understand more than you do that I do not deserve a relationship with Sasuke. I'm abiding his desires for one here because it's as much as I owe. He has others who care about him now, including yourself. I'd rather see him concentrate on that.
Re: same......
You do owe him that. But that shouldn’t be the reason you interact with him. So, I guess I only have one last question.
[ His voice is as tired as he is. In spite of the older man’s seemingly composed demeanor, Stiles has no doubt that the discussion has weighed even more heavily on Itachi. ]
You do love him…right?
[ Ultimately, this is all that matters. It’s the single most important takeaway. It decides how Stiles interacts with this man from now on. ]
Just, tell me the truth. Please.
no subject
It's not even a question which requires him to consider his answer before he gives it. The truth is plain, surely Stiles can see from everything he's said. But perhaps not. He's spent so many years pretending Sasuke was nothing more to him than a measure of power that to put voice to the opposite, the real and hidden wound within himself...]
I do. There's nothing that would ever change that.
[It's spoken in the quietest, almost hesitant tone he's used yet. They've reached the limit of vulnerability and truth Itachi is willing to surrender in this interaction. He turns, beginning the walk back up the dock and toward the city, leaving Stiles behind.]
no subject
Long after Itachi disappears from sight, Stiles lingers at the docks in the Underground, mind turning, turning, turning. ]