[open] Yeah, he technically died.

[itachi_san]

News travels fast around a shinobi community, but rumors travel faster. Especially when they turn out to be true.

The sick Uchiha... died.

Luckily, little Saskue was able to get help and Sakumo was able to resuscitate him. But for a couple of minutes, Itachi was gone. And as dire his health had been, that spoke volumes. And it practically guaranteed that others would have volumes to say to him about it as well.

[He's not going to be out of bed for a while, so come on in and pay him a visit.]

Comments

[copynin]

After Kushina-nee-san had been so nice as to inform Kakashi about the drama going on over at Mikoto-san's house, he decided to visit the newly resurrected man. Granted, every time they spoke to one another, it seemed doomed to end with confusion on at least one of their parts, Kakashi still found himself enjoying conversing with the oldest Uchiha brother.

He found the door to Itachi-san's room opened a bit, but he still knocked before he walked in. "Yo," he said with a lazy wave.

[itachi_san]

Itachi was awake, an infrequent occurrence as of late. He glanced up and activated his sharingan. He'd been conserving his chakra, and rightfully so. Attached to various tubes and wires still, the frail, emaciated man looked like he could use every drop of it he could get.

"Kakashi..." he whispered. "I'm... I'm sorry..."

[one_without_wings]

"Niisan!" of course, there would be the visit from one littlest brother. Currently, Sasuke had a piece of pale blue paper stuck to his forehead. He quite amazingly maneuvered through wires and tubes -too easily maybe- to go and give his brother a hug.

"I made orange juice!" he declared, amazingly proud. "I guess you can't drink it yet, but whenever you can, it'll be there!"

[copynin]

He blinked in confusion. The other man looked worse off than ever and his voice was soft. Only Kakashi's highly trained hearing helped him pick up Itachi's voice.

"Close your eyes, Itachi-san," he said gently as he came into the room and sat down in the sole chair of the room. "What are you sorry for?"

[itachi_san]

He let his sharingan deactivate. He was too tired to keep it on for long anyway.

"I spent a long time... convincing myself that it wasn't this bad... Trying to prove that... I was still the Itachi I once was..." He replied weakly. "That... vision of who I was... I saw it in you... I... was jealous of that... I was unkind..."

The fear, the disgust of how far he had deteriorated, the guilt.... It had overwhelmed him entirely. And he had acted so very disgracefully.

"I'm sorry..."

[bodyflicker]

Shisui might be new in town, but he was the sort of guy who paid attention to things, especially when it came to family. So the moment he heard what had happened to Itachi, he needed to pay a visit.

Once he was allowed, he slipped into the room, pausing by the door to wait for Itachi's acknowledgement. "Cousin?"

[itachi_san]

Itachi smiled as he winced. "Gently, Sasuke... Gently..."

He tried to sit up a little, to ease the ache in his chest that hadn't really dissipated.

"You know... when I was dead... (It felt very strange to say that) I saw you... Well... kind of... It wasn't... you, exactly. But it was an extension of you... A crow... with... little sharingan... A baby one..."

[copynin]

He watched the other man momentarily before closing his own eyes. "Lying to yourself is something that everyone does, I'm afraid. We never want to admit that the things we do, the things we've done, weren't enough or could have been done better. The past...cannot be changed, Itachi-san."

"I look at you and I still see the young boy who tried to beat me in everything I'd ever done. Younger than me as a chunnin, jounin and in joining the ANBU. Ambitious. Willing to protect all of Konoha from something you were told was going to happen, even if it meant destroying your entire clan."

"Yet, you are and always have been Mikoto-san's son to me, even during that battle we had, I saw the baby that she was so happy to have had, that Kushina-nee-san wished for, though she wouldn't admit it."

He smiled wryly as he gave a deep sigh. "Words are words, Itachi-san. I've learned to not let them affect me so deeply. Actions speak louder anyway, or so I've heard. Don't trouble yourself with what you've said before."

[itachi_san]

Well, Shisui had offered to take care of Itachi when they first met - food, rest... And now, Itachi was feeling a bit guilty that he had turned him down. He had obviously gotten worse, not better, since he last saw his cousin.

"Shisui..." He whispered, as he activated his sharingan. He motioned him in, weakly patting the side of the bed. "Oh, it's good to see you..."

[itachi_san]

He nodded, a small smile coming over his lips. "Thank you..."

He tried to sit up a little, but could barely muster the strength to do it.

"My actions... haven't exactly spoken well either..." He admitted, such an insignificant action exerting him so much. "I guess... the treatment... may be worse than the disease... to... to a point..."

[bodyflicker]

Shisui came willingly, settling himself on the edge of the bed and reaching out a gentle hand to touch Itachi's thin face. "It's good to see you too," he murmured, "though I have to say, I wish the conditions were better." Putting it mildly, that, but it was no less true for his understated delivery.

[itachi_san]

Shisui's hand felt so warm, so strong. Just like he always remembered it being when they were children.

"I guess... I need your help... more than I wanted to admit..."

[one_without_wings]

"Ah.. sorry" he did seemingly have to be reminded to be extra-gentle and careful. It seems he might just always be overly exuberant.

"Eh? That's kinda weird. I saw you, in some... place with weird foggy light,a nd you had your sharingan, and then.. then it turned into the mangekyou and somethin went on fire somewhere I think. I felt it..." there was a pause. "But yeah I.. saw you, but I didn' see any crow..." little did he know what exactly might have unfolded.

"It was really strange, cause I saw you fall after that, and then.. then it faded. It's like I was seeing it and seeing... Sakumo trying to revive you at the same time..."

[copynin]

He placed a large hand on Itachi's thin chest, keeping him down on the futon's mattress. "Don't move so much. Sakumo will kill me if you hurt yourself again."

"I heard Shizune-san, Tsunade-sama's assistant, once say that some of the most potent medicines were derived from poisons. So..." He shrugged. "Sometimes, one has to swallow a bitter pill to get the good from it, I guess."

[bodyflicker]

"And you know you have that, 'Tachi." A guess, a hope, that his equivalent for this Itachi had used the same affectionate foreshortening. "Anything you need, I'll give you."

[itachi_san]

It didn't take any force at all to keep Itachi on his back. And since he couldn't move, he resigned himself to staying there.

"Sakumo... said he won't treat me... unless I want to be treated..." he whispered.

The alternative to treatment, of course, was death at this point. The answer between them should be obvious, especially for someone so determined to stay alive for Sasuke's sake. But it was obvious from the way Itachi said it that he hadn't given the medic an answer yet.

"The last treatments... one of them took so much of my chakra that I was paralyzed for days... no way to defend myself, terrified... begging to be allowed to move... medic didn't care. The... the nausea was so bad... couldn't keep anything down for weeks... I begged. I pleaded, Kakashi... to the point I let a Hyuuga reroute my chakra system... for maybe twelve hours of relief... Medic didn't care... I hid it all... in the Akatsuki... but here... Is it... too much to ask... for someone to care? To... to help?"

Terrified of being basically tortured at the end of his life. No wonder he was refusing treatment.

[copynin]

Kakashi stared at the other man grimly as his hand still rested on his thin chest. "I do see the wisdom of Sakumo refusing to treat you unless you cooperate. You and I both know what happens then. Your siblings would be devastated, and your parents would be upset too."

"And if you think that Sakumo would treat you as hideously as that other medic, I think you don't know the boy very well. Haruno Sakura, in any form, is incapable of such cruelty." He sighed heavily. "Take his offer of treatment, Itachi-san. Take it and get better."

[itachi_san]

It was strange, that was certain. But Itachi couldn't ignore the fact that Sasuke had played some kind of role in bringing him back. That he wanted it so badly, he'd found some way to see into the world beyond, through some kind of summon, perhaps. (Crows were the animals of the dead... Perhaps his summons always had that ability and Itachi never knew it...)

"The sharingan... can be used to... to see like that... I use it, with my crows..." He reached out for Sasuke's hand. "Is what Sakumo said... true? Your eyes...? Did they..."

[itachi_san]

Itachi looked away. He'd spoken unkindly again, but it was important that someone at least understand. Perhaps Kakashi would.

"Is it wrong... to want help managing the side effects of treatment? To make them bearable? I... I don't want to lie here... an invalid... sick, in pain... It... it makes death... seem to be the only release..."

He hated admitting that. He really did.

"I've tried to talk to him... about what his treatment will be... But he doesn't seem to care... At least, not enough to tell me what I have to endure..."

[copynin]

"No, it is not wrong, but you are not a medical nin, nor am I. I could not manage my own care very well, and if I was forced into the care of anyone, I could think of much worse than someone who has studied under Tsunade-sama." He sighed a bit, removing his forgotten hand to rub at his visible eye. "I know that being bedridden, unable to do anything is the worst thing for someone who is used to action."

He dropped his hand into his lap and looked at Itachi-san steadily. "How have you approached him? That might change his reaction to you immensely."

[itachi_san]

"I've really made a mess of things, Shisui..." He whimpered as much as he whispered. His plans, his missions, especially his health. "A real mess of things..."

He paused, gulping silently. His thin body trembled under the sheet.

"I'm scared..."

[itachi_san]

Well, avoiding him didn't work... And it was pretty clear what the consequences were of Itachi managing his own care at this point.

"Usually... when he's healing me... For one reason or another. I try to ask him then." He admitted. "It... Hasn't turned out well..."

[one_without_wings]

"Yeah. It's true." he closed his eyes a second, took in an imperceptibly shaky breath...
When he opened them again, there it was. The newly born sharingan, with just one tomoe. "I didn't... want to lose you, niisan." he closed his eyes once more. "I was scared... really scared... but you told me to believe in you, so I kept... calling..."

[itachi_san]

"I'm... glad you did. I'm... so glad you did..."

He felt tears sting the corners of his eyes as he recognized the bits of red and swirls of chakra that he recognized as sharingan. He'd all but completely traumatized the little boy.

But if he saw what Itachi could barely believe he saw, then Itachi knew what had to happen next. And he didn't want to wait, in case... well...

"Do me... a favor... I have a few sealed scrolls in my things, over there..." he pointed weakly at the bookshelf. "Find... a small one... that's sealed with a bloody thumbprint..."

[one_without_wings]

"...niisan..." he could see the thin veil of water accumulating in his brother's eyes, but sooner than later, Itachi spoke again.

"Scroll?" he gave a blink and looked over to where he was pointed to. Hastily rolling off his brother's bed, he padded hurriedly to the bookshelf and started rummaging through things with extreme care that one would think him incapable of in such excitement.

"..hm.. bloody print... bloody print..." he muttered. He said 'small' scroll...
Oh! There it was! He blinked at it. It was all black and red, somewhat ominous-looking... but then again, he could say he had met ominous in the face.

"Found it!" he cried out triumphantly before racing back to the bed and holding it out. "It's this one!"