how did this even happen...

[mooneye]

It wasn't a bad sort of place. Lots of things to do and people to see. Plenty of freedom to dart over the rooftops and down the alleys--or out of the village and into the woods and rocky wild places beyond. Obito liked Michi no Sato.

He had stopped for lunch and was eating at a table outside the restaurant, watching people walk past. The food was good. The cold breeze was nice. Ah, yes. Years and years trapped in a cave with a crazy old man and a bunch of plant monsters--it had left him really able to appreciate the little things.

[ooc: here is an AU Obito in his twenties. Got through the time with Madara, and Rin's death, but didn't go completely evil after all of it...]

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[seafare]

"But I am not gentle." That part was spoken only softly, and more to himself than to Itachi. Truthfully--he was being very gentle as he soothed and petted the other man.

[itachi_san]

"I was gentle... when I killed them... Mom said so. As the sword ran her through..." he whispered sadly, but didn't dwell on it. "It's okay to be gentle... I like you..."

[seafare]

Kisame simply continued to brush his finger's against Itachi's cheek and his hair. Little, light touches. He had never killed anyone gently. His sword did not slip and steal life with a whisper, it tore people to shreds. Still. It was interesting. Nobody had ever called him gentle before and he was being gentle in this moment, he supposed.

[itachi_san]

Itachi, of course, was a very gentle man. Even when he killed, he did so as painlessly as possible. He was merciful. And yet, life was completely merciless to him in return.

But Kisame's touch was soothing. Gentle fingers traced over sunken cheeks and dull, limp hair.

"How come you never touched me... when we were Akatsuki?"

He stumbled over that last word.

[seafare]

He was silent for a while after the question, thinking about it. "Would you have wanted me to?" he asked, at length. "There was more..." he paused, trying to think of a way to put it. "...distance between us, there and then. Than there has been lately."

[itachi_san]

"I did that...?" he asked, most likely referring to the distance between them. "I pushed Sasuke away too..."

His pause was longer than Kisame's, and more of a struggle as well.

"Regret that." he finally added. His voice was stern, but it didn't sound that way under the circumstances. "Tired... of being alone..."

[seafare]

"You never pushed me away, Itachi. You just... didn't let me in, either. I understand why now." He paused a moment. "And you aren't alone anymore, eh? You've found many people in this place who love you."

[itachi_san]

"You love me?" he slurred with a hopeful smile. "Mom loves me. Sasuke sister... doesn't want me weak. Not sure if she wants me dead or not after that..."

[seafare]

He murmured back an affirmative. Because--of course he did. It was simple, really. They had been friends for so many years.

"I haven't met your sister."

[itachi_san]

"I love you too..." Itachi nudged himself a little closer. "There's a girl Sasuke here... Got a temper. But she's nice. She carried me home too..."

[seafare]

"How kind of her. You are building a little family here, hm? Or your mother is, maybe."

[itachi_san]

"A family... I didn't kill... I like it..." he mumbled. He was smiling, kind of. "You can be in it too. Little me adores you..."

[seafare]

"You were--are--a very sweet child, by the way." That made him smirk, though it was a fond expression.

[itachi_san]

"You're so funny... I didn't get to be a child." Itachi laughed under his breath. It sounded more like coughing, though, than laughing.

[seafare]

Kisame only nodded. It was true of many shinobi--but some more than others.

[itachi_san]

Half-lidded eyes met with a lopsided smile.

"What's it like?"

[seafare]

"What is what like, Itachi-san?" He passed his hand down the slender shoulder and the arm beneath the blankets.

[itachi_san]

"... Being a child?" he mumbled thoughtfully. "A real one... not one that has to fight in the war..."

The war he was referring to was the third shinobi world war. It was a brutal time in the Land of Fire, and across the entire continent. A lot of bloodshed. A lot of death.

Kisame was fifteen when the war ended. Itachi was only four.

"Is it nice?"

[seafare]

A pause. "Some of it was nice." The Hidden Mist had not been such an easy place to grow up, though there had been times with his mother and father, when he was very young, that had been pleasant enough.

[itachi_san]

"Sometimes... I wish Sasuke'd been born first... so I could have played and run around... cry without getting scolded..." he twitched a little. "But then he'd have had to kill everybody... And he'd be where I am... and that hurts too much... So its better this way... right?"

[seafare]

After a moment of thought. "Your life has been difficult, but you lived it well, Itachi. And I don't think anyone else could have done better with your burden than you did." A pause. "And now in this place where that burden doesn't exist, you get a second chance, remember. Not exactly a blank slate, but a new beginning, at least."

[itachi_san]

"Yeah..." his voice trailed off in a long smile. "That's right..."

Changing the subject was pretty easy. (Thank you, ever-winding stream of consciousness.)

"You're big..."

[seafare]

"Hm. You're small, Itachi-san." He drew one of his pale hands from beneath the blankets so that he could look at it. It was very small, beside his own.

[itachi_san]

Itachi's lifeless hand fit completely within Kisame's. He couldn't even straighten out his fingers on his own.

"Have I always been... this small to him?" He thought aloud. A few fleeting memories of the time they met flashed through his mind. "We're people, not fish..."

[seafare]

Those words made him go still, for a few long moments, before he resumed gently touching the hand in his own, stroking the knuckles. "I thought of that time," he said quietly. "It was the last thing I thought of, before I died."