The Brother I Once Was Pt. 8

Sasuke tightened his hold on his brother. He could feel a warmth on his shoulder. One he wasn't familiar with, comming from his brother. Itachi Uchiha...was crying. "Itachi..."

Itachi's face was now burried into Sasuke's shoulder. He was crying hard and he was shaking badly but he was silent for a while. Sasuke could do nothing but hold his brother helplessly as he cried. At one point Itachi started to cry out loud. Sasuke did his best to calm him down.

"I...Itachi....Brother....It's okay...I'm...I'm here....."

After a long following silence, Sasuke suddenly felt the entire weight of Itachi leaning against him. Itachi had cried himself straight to sleep. That was good. Itachi had not cried since he was very young, It was probably better that he had now instead of still leaving his emotions bottled up for who knows how much longer? Sasuke menuvered his brother around slightly and laid on the floor, making his chest a pillow for Itachi.

Itachi awoke the next morning on his bed. Everything from the night before was extreemly hazey. He lifted himself up with his elbows only to be greeted by a gritting and burning pain in his left arm. But he ignored it.

Mikoto opened Itachi's bedroom door a bit and peeked in. "Itachi....are you awake...?"

"Yeah..." His voice was slightly raspy. Maybe he had caught a cold from being out in the rain. That or from screaming out the night before.

His mother came in and sat down beside him on the bed. Her eyes were full of sadness as she put her arms around him. "Itachi....Shisui is dead....he commited suicide..."

Itachi's eyes widened as the memories suddenly flew back into his head. Getting his gear around, meeting up with Shisui, stopping by the river, Shisui's speach and then of course...Shisui forcing Itachi to hold his head under the water while he drowned. Now he had the Mangekyo Sharingan. His mother hugged him for a few moments before examining him.

"Itachi...."

"..yes..?" He replied shakily.

She looked at him seriously. "Let me see your eyes..."

Itachi paled a bit at this request. Oh no! he thought to himself. Mom will find out for sure! But then Itachi stopped to think. His mother had the Mangekyo Sharingan too. She had accidentally killed her best friend years before Itachi's birth. He looked at her straight in the eyes. As long as he didn't think about the Mangekyo it would not appear. After what seemed like forever, his mother released him and walked out of the room.

Itachi walked outside and looked at the sun shining though the clouds. He felt like his life had suddenly taken a downwards spiral ever since he recieved the shoulder injiry. Speaking of which he should really go get his medicine. Before he could go back inside of the house he noticed a large group of people gathered around his house. Itachi stood there for a while and listened to them say how sorry they were that he had lost his best friend.

He was happy to get away from them when Sasuke pulled him off to the side and gave him his medicine. Sasuke never seemed to miss a beat. Itachi set the glass of water down on the table after taking the pill and sighed.

"Father is down at the police HQ now...they are looking over Shisui's death.........they don't think it was suicide...."

Itachi's heart stopped.

"They think that Shisui was murdered by someone..I don't know everything about what they were saying...Father said you were suppose to go down to HQ when you woke up so he could talk it over with you...the case and stuff I mean..." Sasuke looked down at the floor. He didn't feel comfortable discussing it with Itachi for fear that he might upset him.

Itachi forced a convincing smile. "Alright. Well, then I guess I am heading over to the police headquarters then" He chuckled a bit. Itachi stood up and started walking twards the door.

"Itachi...." Sasuke called from the table. His older brother turned to look at him.

"Are you going to be okay.....?"

Itachi nodded to Sasuke and started walking to his destination. If there was one thing Itachi hated more than his father it was the walk down to the HQ that day. Everyone around him was talking and whispering to their neighbors. They were all talking about Shisui's death. As Itachi walked by, most of them fell dead silent. Others bowed to Itachi and whispered a prayer for him.

It all made Itachi sick. The prayers, the apoligies, the pity...it made him mad. It burned inside him like a raging fire. The fools didn't know the whole story. By the time Itachi got to HQ he was so furious with the people around him that he thought his Mangekyo was going to activate and he was just going to start knocking people down. He managed to keep his cool as he approached his father.

"You wanted to see me, Father?" He asked in a low voice.

"Yes...we now thing we know who killed Shisui....." Fugaku sighed deeply as he looked at his eldest son. "We believe the murderer is......."