December 6th
Title: The Sound of Silence
Author: hiza_chan
Pairing/Characters: Shisui/Itachi
Rating: PG-13
Total length: 1,700
Warnings: Angst. Dancing on water. Ghosts. Zombies.
Summary: A love song for the dead, a waltz for the damned. He'll never leave you.
.
He finds Itachi on the shores of the Nakano, his eyes dull as he looks out over the water. There is still blood beneath his nails, dried and clinging to the bitten edges of his cuticles. Shisui wants to grin and say what he's thinking, wants to sit down next to his friend and nudge their shoulders together. He wants Itachi to look at him, and he wants to say Itachi, you should have kicked that nasty habit years ago.
He doesn't, because that's not the proper way to acknowledge that Itachi has just had one hell of a fucked up mission. Not the correct way to comfort someone who still has his teammates’ blood drying on his hands.
"It's not your fault," he says quietly, sliding down next to Itachi on the damp riverbank. Mud squelches beneath him and he grimaces, doesn't know where to set his hands.
Itachi is quiet.
He doesn't say "yes it was," but Shisui hears it anyway- etched into the way Itachi is sitting, shoulders slumped just the slightest bit, chin resting on bloodied, nearly steady hands.
Thunder cracks above them, a beat- maybe two, and lightning tears the sky asunder, illuminates the somber gray riverbank and the bloated river, makes Itachi's pale face look even more drawn and haggard.
Blue and gray and white. And, of course, the red. Always the red.
Shisui sighs and nudges their shoulders together anyway.
Another clap of thunder, another burst of lightning- blue and crackling. Above them, the skies open up.
He can hear Itachi breathing, quiet and too steady- none of the emotion that Shisui knows Itachi is feeling. Shisui can feel it where their shoulders are still pressed together when Itachi starts to tremble. He listens to Itachi breathe, feels him shake, and watches the river tumble restlessly with the storm. Things are always too quiet here after a mission like that, just like Itachi- the silence pressing and sealing in the grief.
He hadn't really expected the rain to be this heavy, but now that it's started, he realizes he doesn't really want it to stop. The wet clings to Itachi- droplets tracing the line of his jaw, catching in his lashes, soaking his hair. Like this, it almost looks like he is crying.
It isn't like Itachi had been particularly close to any of them. Just another mission gone bad, one mistake. It happens a lot in their line of business, but he's also pretty sure that it's never happened to Itachi.
Itachi heaves a sigh, cloaked by the sounds of the storm. Shisui hears it.
Beyond them, the water is tumbling faster and faster, the wind picking up around them and sending Itachi's bound hair whipping every which way. He wonders how bad this storm is supposed to be.
Itachi's wrist is cool, damp from the rain and still tacky with blood. Shisui knows that if he pulls his hand away, the red will cling to him now, parasitic. Crack, and the world goes blue. He thinks, this blood used to be that color, before the oxygen hit it- when it spilled out of Ame in a spray of gore. He doesn't know what he's doing anymore. They're only fourteen, not quite adults, but never children.
He remembers the first time Itachi had killed someone- seven years old, plump baby cheeks streaked with blood, eyes wide even as they ran red. No, never children.
Itachi looks at him strangely when Shisui pulls him to his feet. Just one quick look of bafflement that quickly gives way to a careful blankness. Beyond them, the water is churning- white clinging to every wave. The river is overrun, just starting to spill past its banks. The world is quiet, save the crackle of thunder and howl of the wind.
Shisui steps out onto it, sets one careful foot atop the waves and pulls Itachi out after him.
The water is far from calm, so it's a bit more difficult to keep his footing. Like walking in snow almost, wayward waves catching on his shoes, nearly tripping him up. He keeps walking until they're standing near the middle, pauses.
His mother always used to tell him that dancing was a lot like fighting. That the steps were just another form of taijutsu, the rhythm a subtle genjutsu, the feel just an extension- like the thrill of victory and the adrenaline of a good fight. He'd never been quite as good as her, but he'd tried to match her steps, a kid clinging to his mother's skirts- spinning and stepping on her toes and giggling when she dipped him low over the kitchen floor.
Itachi's waist is narrow, the bones of his hips pressing against Shisui's thumbs through his thin uniform, but it feels good to wrap his hands around that narrow waist and tuck himself close enough to hear Itachi's heartbeat over the roar of the waves and wind and sky. Itachi doesn't ask him what he's doing, nor does he push away. Instead he shudders, and lets Shisui press close- lets Shisui guide him into a faltering, trembling waltz, clumsy on the surface of the angry waves.
Shisui feels it when the tension goes out of Itachi's frame, the gentle way he slowly relaxes into Shisui's touch, burying his face in the curve of Shisui's neck.
"This is a gross misuse of chakra, Shisui," he says into the soft skin there, muffled, his lips moving lightly against Shisui's pulse.
Shisui smiles. "So you aren't having fun?"
Itachi buries closer, and Shisui feels the way he frowns in contemplation and then ever so slowly, the way that frown gives way to a small smile. "...I did not say that."
The storm rages on, and beneath them, the water dances too.
.
Later, when they're lying curled and twisted together atop Itachi's futon, Shisui leans in- presses kisses up Itachi's jaw until he reaches his ear, purrs the words there like a secret.
"If I can't be with you, I don't want this life."
and
"Take me with you, when you go."
and
"I'll always be by your side."
Itachi closes his eyes. Something hurts, jagged and broken -like shattered glass- beneath his ribs. When Shisui murmurs, quiet and happy, "sleep, I'll still be here in the morning. I promise," Itachi sleeps.
.
Shisui's skin is clammy beneath his as he goes under.
He doesn't struggle.
A moment passes. Two. Several more.
Itachi breathes.
Shisui doesn't.
.
"Remember that time we danced?"
Shisui's eyes are bright. The rest of him isn't.
His fingers ghost across Itachi's cheekbone- feather light.
"Remember the way the water felt beneath us?"
Lips against his, faint.
"Remember that, Itachi?"
Itachi is quiet.
He doesn't talk to his ghosts.
.
The Nakano is calm this time, cool beneath the soles of Itachi's feet. The water is calm and cool, and he can't even pretend to think of Shisui's smiling mouth and the clumsy way he'd dipped Itachi- low enough that Itachi's hair had brushed the surface of the water. He can't even have that small pleasure, because he cannot seem to shake loose the memory of Shisui sinking, swallowed up.
He shouldn't be here. Not now, not here- not when there are ANBU and jonin about that would kill for a chance to capture an S-class missing nin.
Behind him, the water moves- footsteps.
"Would you join me in this dance?"
Itachi breathes and breathes. He is quiet. Always quiet.
He does not talk to his ghosts.
He doesn't dance with them either.
Movement near the shore, clumsy, a chuunin closing in.
Shisui presses a kiss to the back of his neck, tremulous and faltering, whispers something quiet into the skin there.
The water moves sluggishly at his feet. His ghost is gone.
The chuunin makes her move.
Itachi takes his leave as well.
.
"Itachi, love, why would you do this to us?"
His mother is crying, her form flickering and unsteady. None of the grace that Shisui uses to keep his image together. Itachi blinks and can see the cave wall through her head.
"Why?" she asks.
At her distorted shoulder, Itachi's father is silent.
Always silent.
.
His first glimpse of Sasuke hurts. Unexpected, but it hurts to see the hatred- the seed he had planted grown into a flourishing, tangled knot of a tree. Lightning flickers in his little brother's hand, makes the world go blue and Itachi remembers angry waves and vengeful skies and the way the glow had lit up Shisui's face.
"I've survived!"
Itachi wishes he hadn't. Wishes that he'd died with Shisui that day, or that he'd taken him along like he'd asked. Wishes-
But it isn't time yet.
Sasuke's blood is red, skin pale, eyes angry.
No, it isn't time just yet.
.
"Why, Itachi?"
.
"Care for a dance?"
.
His father is quiet and his relatives scream him to sleep.
Shisui touches him, a hand to his forehead, and hums quietly. Soothingly.
He sleeps.
.
Sasuke is shaking, back pressed to cool stone, and Itachi can't seem to catch his breath. He can hardly see now, blood in his eyes- bitter against his tongue. Sasuke looks scared.
It still hurts.
"Sorry Sasuke."
He smiles.
"There won't be a next time."
.
"Care for a dance?"
Itachi is quiet. He does not speak to his ghosts.
"Oh come now, it doesn't matter much anymore. You're dead."
Shisui hums good-naturedly and plucks at a string at Itachi's throat. He wrinkles his nose.
"You smell a bit, you know? Ectoplasm, maybe? Definitely formaldehyde."
Itachi is quiet. Before him, the Nakano is angry, tossing in the throes of a storm. It licks at the edges of his shoes, bloated and greedy. Above them the sky flickers blue and gray.
He shouldn't be here.
He is dead.
"So how about that dance?"
Itachi does not dance with his ghosts, but then, he is not entirely himself at the moment.
He takes Shisui's hand.
Shisui smiles.
They dance.