Shadows moved behind the door. Mother said quietly:
"Itachi, I brought you dinner. If you don't want to join us, you can eat in your room."
Not waiting for an answer, she left the door. Quiet, receding footsteps echoed in the hallway.
Thank you, mom.
The last evening before the uprising. The last time he would see his family alive. Itachi bit his lip and suppressed the lump of despair rising in his throat.
Sasuke was at the academy. Sarada had gone to Naruto's — he himself had suggested she go check on the boy, just in case. All the other Uchiha were in the district. The Military Police members had returned home early today; they had a short day: just as one of Itachi's subordinates was distracting Sasuke at the academy, other members of the Root had announced repairs in the Police Corps on the Hokage's orders. No one would find out that there was no such order in reality, no one would remember. There would be no one left to remember. The Uchiha, on the contrary, were glad the workday was shortened — they needed to prepare for the uprising.
Itachi stood up and put on his ANBU uniform, fastened his weapons. It was time to begin. The dinner remained untouched on the floor in the hallway.
****
"Who's there?" a woman's voice uttered.
The first house he visited. Itachi had never been here before. Everything was new and yet familiar.
He stepped out of the hallway shadow and looked into the unfamiliar woman's eyes, sending a genjutsu into her pupils. He caught her heavy body, lowered it to the floor to avoid unnecessary noise, then quietly went up the steps to the second floor. He pushed open the door behind which he sensed a familiar chakra presence.
"Mom?"
Izumi froze in the middle of the room. She had heard her mother's voice and must have wanted to come out and ask if she was being called.
"Itachi-kun?" Her eyes widened in surprise.
Something heavy pressed on his chest, making his heart beat faster. A sudden weakness awoke throughout his body, spreading, flowing from his chest to his limbs, seeping into his muscles as if stuffing them with cotton.
What am I doing? God, what am I about to do?
Izumi was stunned by Itachi's sudden appearance in ANBU uniform and armed. She didn't understand anything and intuitively sensed something was wrong, but clearly didn't expect treachery from him.
His knees trembled. He moved closer. Izumi's eyes widened even more. She was afraid to breathe, as if she thought Itachi was an apparition and feared it would vanish if she did something wrong.
I wish I really were just a vision.
Another step. Truly, they had never been this close to each other before. A flicker of fear flashed in Izumi's gaze.
"Itachi-kun, what are you…"
Itachi raised his hand and lightly touched Izumi's cheek with his fingers. He looked at her, examining and imprinting in his memory the features of her face in minute detail: frightened brown eyes, thick eyelashes, a mole under her right eye. His fingers moved. If Izumi hadn't once stroked him the same way, he wouldn't have known it was possible and right.
Itachi leaned in, buried his nose in Izumi's soft cheek, and lightly touched his lips to hers. Let the whole village consider him an incredibly talented shinobi, mature beyond his years, but Uchiha Itachi was still a teenager: he was kissing a girl for the first time and had no idea how it was done. He could feel: she was scared. But he was scared too. Izumi trustingly leaned into the kiss, responding. This gentle creature, infinitely devoted to him, was the one he intended to kill.
Right now, now I must…
But Itachi couldn't. Touching Izumi's cool, moist lips and feeling her warm breath on his cheek, he felt his heart leaping from his chest, setting a rhythm that shook his entire body with a frantic pulse. Itachi kissed Izumi again — clumsily catching her lip with his lips, but there was so much childish, deadly passion in this kiss that his inexperience didn't matter. His hands trembled. All the shinobi self-control he had painstakingly cultivated over the years — was flying to hell. An unknown, pulling sensation of pleasure awakened somewhere below and drove him mad. He didn't understand what was happening to him. Didn't know how to stop, break the kiss, and do what he had set out to do: begin his mission.
This is impossible. Why did I even kiss her?
Not just a fleeting desire. He wanted to thank Izumi for everything. For her tenderness and kindness, her loyalty despite his indifference. Itachi wanted to give her at least something at the end.
With a trembling hand, he drew Izumi closer to him. Two trembling organisms, pressed tightly together. Now Itachi could feel: she was trembling too, and her heart was pounding just as wildly in her chest as his own. Did she understand why he had come? No… Unlikely.
If I don't do it now — I won't do it at all.
His right hand imperceptibly slipped to where the kunai were hidden. Itachi felt as if his limbs were acting independently of him, not obeying his brain, as if his personality had suddenly split in two: one belonging to the boy in love, the other to the true shinobi. These two personalities fought within him and acted simultaneously, unable to hinder each other.
His trembling fingers suddenly clenched firmly around the hilt of the kunai. Warm lips, breath, an amazing scent… He desperately didn't want to give this up, but his hand reached behind Izumi's back on its own. With a sharp motion, Itachi drove the blade into her neck and pulled away, surfacing from the intoxicating madness.
An instant, fatal blow. The girl's body went limp; Itachi, pulling out the kunai, caught Izumi and gently lowered her to the floor. She hadn't understood anything and likely hadn't had time to feel anything.
Itachi hadn't chosen Izumi as his first target for no reason. He knew that killing his friend and his parents would be the hardest, and from the moment Izumi died, there would be no turning back. He could die himself in a fight with his father, so Itachi had prudently postponed the visit home for later. Before they met, he needed to accomplish at least something… And the first victim was Izumi.
Itachi looked at his trembling palms. He had killed her. These hands had ended the life of a person who loved him and trusted him infinitely, not expecting treachery.
What have I done?
His neck, lips, hands — pulsed from the recent kiss and shock, as if the blood had become too thick and was forcing its way through the arteries with great difficulty. His straining heart constricted with pain. Itachi couldn't fully believe that the girl lying at his feet was dead. Maybe he was imagining it? Maybe he hadn't done anything yet and was only picturing all this, even if too realistically? He fell to his knees and felt for a pulse on the warm neck. There was none.
Gathering his thoughts and finding resolve had been incredibly difficult, and Itachi thought that when it was all over, he would feel better. How wrong he was. He didn't feel better at all; it became even worse.
I killed her.
The last time he had been this feverish was the day Tenma died. He looked into Izumi's open, glassy eyes, and the room tinted with shades of blood — the Sharingan had activated. Fire-natured chakra surged to his eyes, awakening the clan's dojutsu. More and more, hotter and hotter. Itachi felt as if his eyeballs were about to burst or melt. Or perhaps they were already melting. Something warm trickled down his cheeks… Tears? He touched his cheeks and looked at his fingers, stained with something crimson.
Not tears — blood.
…when he left Izumi's house, having finished off her mother, Uchiha Madara materialized before him.
"I see you've already started."
Itachi didn't answer: he couldn't speak. He was desperately gathering his shattered soul piece by piece to overcome the sudden weakness and still complete the mission. An astonishing amount of chakra had been spent on the Sharingan, which had activated pointlessly over Izumi's body.
"I'll deal with the women and children, as many as I can," said Madara.
His accomplice's calm voice was irritating.
"No. You'll start from the east, and I from the west," Itachi forced out, struggling to give his voice firmness. "As agreed."
"Don't overexert yourself."
"Shut up."
"You're still a child. If the darkness in your heart becomes too thick, you won't endure it."
Itachi hated to realize that Madara was right. And the proof was the weakness throughout his body and the trembling in his limbs, which he couldn't manage to control. He turned around. Madara's expression was hidden by the orange mask, but his figure was surrounded by an aura of death. This one wouldn't break. This one would endure.
"No need to worry."
"I'm not worried. Just rationally distributing our forces. I possess spatial ninjutsu, so it's more reasonable for me to eliminate the women and children before cries for help and commotion alert the men. Don't you think so?"
"Do as you wish."
Sasuke would soon return from the academy. He needed to finish the mission. No time to argue.
"We'll meet when it's all over."
Madara dissolved into the air.
Itachi took a deep breath and tilted his head back. A starry sky, peace. For everyone in the village, but not for him and not for the Uchiha clan. He closed his eyes and listened to the darkness that had made a nest in his heart. Peering into this black gloom, Itachi searched for his next victim.
…stepped into the house. At the far end of the hallway, a single chakra hearth was visible.
"Chakra is raging all over the district. So this is your doing, Uchiha Itachi?"
Tekka was an excellent sensor. He was exceptionally skilled with his dojutsu even compared to other Uchiha.
"But you're here… Then why is the chakra still agitated?"
"Now is not the time for questions."
"Yes. I see."
"If you sensed something was wrong, why didn't you come out to help the others?"
"I was about to, but you beat me to it."
Tekka caught his gaze. Itachi calmly received the wave of chakra into his pupils that was meant to plunge him into a genjutsu. Nothing happened. Tekka, puzzled that his technique hadn't worked, changed expression.
"This is… Impossible! M-Mangekyo…"
He saw the pattern. I wonder what mine looks like? Not like Shisui's?
In an instant, Itachi was beside the officer and drove his sword into his stomach. Tekka fell to his knees, looking at him in horror. Itachi leaned over him, approached his sweat-covered face, and said harshly:
"You always had a bad habit of underestimating your opponent."
With a sharp motion, he pulled out the sword, and Tekka collapsed heavily onto the floor. Blood spread across the tatami, but not a drop touched Itachi. This was shinobi etiquette — not to soil oneself with the blood of the slain.
"Itachi…" Tekka forced out with his last strength. "They won't forgive you…"
A last breath, and the former officer fell silent. Life had left him. Itachi sheathed his sword behind his back.
I'm not expecting forgiveness.
The former weakness vanished as if by magic. Every person has a limit. If you go beyond that limit — all feelings shut off, and Itachi had already gone far beyond his threshold of sensitivity. His shattered soul had crusted over with ice and turned to stone. Itachi broke into strangers' homes, killed unarmed men who didn't expect an attack, terrified women and children his accomplice hadn't yet reached, and felt nothing: no sympathy, no pity, no guilt. In his chilled soul, an abyss had opened, a black hole that absorbed any emotions and turned them to ice. He didn't even hold the thought in his mind that all this was for the village's good. He simply wielded his sword purposefully, taking people's lives. Itachi felt not like a shinobi, but like a butcher in a slaughterhouse.
Someone else's home. Familiar smells of a cooked dinner and domestic comfort to someone. A barefoot man pressed his back against the wall and hid, waiting for Itachi. But the Sharingan allowed him to see the chakra hearth to the right of the door; the victim's plan failed. Itachi stepped into the room and kicked the man who lunged at him toward the shoji. The flimsy paper door structure shattered under the weight of the heavy body. The sword whistled through the air, and blood splattered onto the white canvas of the torn paper.
Next room. A housewife, speechless with terror, pressed her back against the stove. Itachi caught her in a genjutsu and drove his sword into her heart. Went up to the second floor. A child, a little older than Sasuke, didn't even wake up; he died instantly.
Next was Yashiro's house. Itachi entered the hallway and saw the corpse of a dark-haired girl in a pool of blood on the floor. Madara had already worked here. But on the second floor, someone's chakra was felt, not Yashiro's. In the dark room, gripping a kunai in each hand, a young genin was waiting for him.
Where have I seen you? Right. That time when the patrolmen were harassing Sasuke and Sarada, this guy tried to protect her. Tried poorly.
Itachi deactivated the Sharingan, giving his eyes time to recover a little. Michi struck with his right hand, left… Even without using his dojutsu, Itachi easily dodged his attacks, intercepted the opponent's kunai, and took them for himself.
Too slow.
An elbow strike to the solar plexus sent the boy flying back against the bed frame.
"Where is the head?"
"Who?" the boy gasped out.
"The clan head. Yashiro. Where is he?"
"I don't know."
Itachi punched him in the stomach and looked into his eyes again. No, this one really didn't know. He raised his hand to kill Michi.
"So this is what you're like," the guy uttered, grimacing in pain, "Sarada's half-brother."
Itachi raised his hand with the confiscated kunai but stopped a centimeter from his victim's throat.
"What?"
"You're alike. I don't know how, but…"
Fear of death mingled with some incomprehensible feeling wandered in Michi's slanted eyes, as if in his dying hour he had gained insight and realized something very important for himself.
Itachi, who hadn't felt anything in his chest for about an hour except a vacuum, was now drenched in a cold sweat.
We're alike.
"In appearance?"
"Not only," Michi, holding his breath, glanced sideways at the kunai at his neck. "In everything."
Itachi, gritting his teeth, slit his throat. Michi choked on blood, vainly trying to breathe.
In everything. Can you really imagine Sarada just as cold-bloodedly taking your life?
Footsteps sounded on the stairs. Itachi instantly activated his dojutsu. A shadow flashed in the doorway and, noticing the dying nephew and the killer above him — turned and fled. Stumbling, tumbled down the stairs in several jumps, flew out into the street, and began fleeing from his executioner across the playground in the nearest square. A man with white hair, Uchiha Yashiro.
Itachi pursued his victim. Yashiro backed away, tangling in his own feet and grabbing the supports of the swings with his hands. He was thrashing around the playground with such desperation…
How pathetic you are. And they chose you as leader instead of my father?
Yashiro tripped and sprawled on the sand. Itachi drew his sword from its sheath and announced in an icy tone:
"Surrender."
Yashiro trembled.
"Y-you won't… It won't help. Killing me is pointless. There's another leader, even Fugaku-taicho didn't know about him. I was controlled."
"God, you don't even have the courage to take responsibility now. The head of the Uchiha clan cowardly hides behind others' backs. How utterly… rotten!"
Instead of standing up to defend the remnants of the clan, the leader was begging for his life from a boy he had just recently shamefully expelled from the meeting.
"You must believe me! It's all…"
Madara materialized beside Itachi.
"You?!" Yashiro blurted out in disbelief.
"Hmm, long time no see. A couple of days, right?" said Madara.
Yashiro trembled violently.
"But why?!"
"Itachi, did you call me for this nonsense?"
They had agreed that if necessary, Itachi would release chakra and Madara would appear beside him instantly. Itachi used this trick to show Yashiro the real state of affairs.
"I simply chose Itachi, not you. That's all," said Madara. "Uh, all I can advise you… try to fight for your life."
"W-wait…"
"Alright, Itachi, finish here yourself. I'll go work some more."
He vanished, sucking his body into the hole in his mask. Itachi lowered his head, looking at Yashiro trembling with fear.
"I… I… will s-stop… We'll stop the uprising! It'll be as you want."
"Trying to save your own skin?"
"Please, Itachi! Uchiha Itachi!"
Yashiro looked utterly worthless. If he hadn't given in to Madara and led the clan back onto the path of rebellion, Shisui's plan would have worked. Everything would have ended peacefully. In Itachi's empty soul, which had cut down a good part of his own clan, a strong, icy hatred and an unfamiliar thirst for killing boiled up. He had never wanted to kill. He killed on orders, out of necessity, stepping over his good nature, and the desire to inflict inhuman suffering on a person was new to him.
"Stand up," he commanded.
Yashiro's narrow eyes opened as wide as possible.
"You are a shinobi," Itachi continued impassively. "Stand up and fight, damn it."
Yashiro remained silent.
"Do you have no pride at all?"
Trembling with fear, he struggled to his feet and shook his head.
"Don't underestimate me."
Pathetic wretch. How I hate you.
"Those are just words. How about backing them up with action? Maybe you'll finally attack?"
Itachi's Sharingan detected chakra movement in Yashiro's body. He tried to plunge him into a genjutsu and quickly formed hand seals.
Fire Release.
Yashiro took a deep breath, puffing out his cheeks. No technique followed. He simply exhaled the air back out.
"Well. And where is it?" asked Itachi.
"Huh?"
Itachi watched him coldly.
"You were so scared you didn't notice my genjutsu. I caught you in an illusion the moment you fell."
Yashiro trembled.
"I didn't tell you to fight for no reason. I wanted you to feel how helpless you really are. How did you even plan to oppose the village, eh, Yashiro?"
Itachi didn't care that before him stood a man older in age and higher in status. The moment the hint of destroying the Uchiha clan was first voiced in Danzo's office, Itachi felt he had the right to decide how to speak to anyone, regardless of etiquette norms. Back then, he had told Danzo to shut up, and now he calmly humiliated the leader of what was once the most powerful clan in the Hidden Leaf Village.
"You all underestimated Konoha. And me."
Yashiro was pale with horror, frozen before him like a rabbit before a boa constrictor.
"Mangekyo Sharingan," Itachi uttered and added, like a sentence: "Tsukuyomi."
New eyes, a new technique, obtained just over an hour ago after killing Izumi. Now Itachi understood what Shisui meant when he insisted he didn't need this power.
Yashiro plunged into an ocean of darkness. He looked around helplessly but saw nothing, heard only the voice of his executioner — Itachi made sure of that.
"Because of you, I killed with my own hands a person I loved. And I'll kill a few more relatives after you. All because of your hopeless cowardice and ignorance."
"Where am I?"
Yashiro seemed not to hear his words.
"I completely control this world: both time and space. This is the hell I created especially for you, Yashiro."
The ocean of gloom parted at Itachi's will. The victim finally saw him.
"So. Let's begin. We're in no hurry."
Itachi extended his hand, and Yashiro's body lifted above the lower boundary of the space. His arms spread out. He was magnetically drawn to a wooden cross created by imagination. Itachi unhurriedly drew the sword from the sheath on his back and drove it into Yashiro's stomach. He screamed. The pain here was completely real and, by Itachi's will, could last an eternity.
"I won't let you die so simply," he said calmly. "You don't deserve it."
He drew the sword from his back again.
Yashiro screamed and shrieked, tearing his throat hoarsely, while Itachi delightedly poked the blade around in his entrails and realized with surprise that he was indeed enjoying this. He was taking revenge. For Izumi and for all the Uchiha he had killed that night. The pain, which had long exceeded his threshold of sensitivity and drilled a hole into the abyss in his heart, now rushed back and, by Itachi's will, crashed down upon Yashiro.
"That was a warm-up. You haven't felt real pain yet."
A second in the real world could stretch for days in Itachi's Tsukuyomi. Blood streamed from Yashiro's body. Magnetized to the cross, he resembled a hedgehog bristling with swords.
"P-please, I beg you… Kill me. Kill me!"
"Too early," Itachi calmly informed him. "You took responsibility for the Uchiha clan. Now suffer. Feel their pain. As the leader, I'll give you more than enough for each one."
"I understand. Kill me! Ki-ill me!"
A new sword appeared in his hand.
"No."
…stopped the Tsukuyomi. Yashiro, drooling, lay sprawled on the sand of the playground. Itachi had completely destroyed his mind, and a body cannot exist without a mind. The Uchiha clan no longer had a leader.