The Stage's Avenger

A/N: NOTICE!!!! This is going to be an important part of this chapter. Some of you may have noticed how, last chapter, I blended what had been Sasuke’s interpretation of his flashback in to Itachi’s own flashback on the player, and right after moved him back in to real-time. I have not gotten any reviews directly complaining about confusion as to how this moved along, but someone did mention how they got a little lost. I didn’t want to put ~*~*~*~ like I often do at a scene change, because I feel that this story moves by too fluidly, and people’s mood has the chance to be ruined by the gear-shift, and having to recognize that.

I’ve decided instead, that the first sentence and the last sentence of a flashback will be put in to italics. Keep track of that!! And use your best judgment to decide if it’s a flashback – OR JUST SOMEONE THINKING.

Also, I noticed that in chapter two, I gave Kabuto dirty-blond hair, and in chapter three, I made it silver. =D No one pointed it out, so I just won’t do anything to correct it. Honestly, I’d rather not have Kabuto with silver hair – but if I describe him as blond, people may get confused with him later. So, unless people say in the reviews that they like Kabuto blond, I’m gonna keep it silver.

Disclaimer: I do not own Uchiha Itachi’s libido.

The Stage’s Avenger
by Peaches

Chapter Four

Itachi had stopped in the hallway at an idea striking him, grip sinking in to stringy midnight strands as a novice set of lips and teeth worked at his jugular. Not the exact spot of his enjoyment, but trial and error would expose that.

His brother was such a fast learner. Sickening glee warmed his gut and fed an arousal he had been unable to completely will away since it all began. Strong arms around the narrow frame squeezed, smirking in to his brother’s ear as he halted the progress to his room. Instead, he rested Sasuke’s back against the wall. Teeth and tongue deadened when his own voice slipped in to the air and coated the paler ear with the croak of his excitement.

“I could fuck you right here… Just like this.” Electricity jagged through his spine when knees tightened around his sides. For as much as they could in their enfeebled state. Arms were like melted butter, too, hanging on his shoulders and leaving fingers to only loosely paw at the ponytail . That was probably why his spine tingled. Itachi nuzzled his voice deeper in to the other’s ear, pausing in every word to slip his tongue inside and catch the way the sex-weakened body twisted with being trapped between steeled muscle and lacquered wood wall. It didn’t take much encouragement from his hand to push a supple leg against the wall and expose more tender bits to be nudged by his hips.

“Would you like that…?”

There was no confession, save the lack of argument that came from the body shivering against him. He wondered if he could let Sasuke get away with such a shy response, smirking as he nudged again at the used passage. It was still slick, and accommodated to him with their recent activity. It welcomed him, with some resistance to the angle and an uneven squeak in his ear as Itachi only sighed.

“Show me how much…”

Everything else was put away. He had bought dust sheets to put on the furniture, in rooms he had frequently occupied until now. The dishes were packed away, and now he was up in his brother’s room, packing the last things in to his bag.

The very last thing. A cornflower denim shirt that was a couple of sizes too large for him. Proof that, even with his coming of age to leave this town, he was still not nearly of the same prowess his brother possessed those years ago.

Now, he was faced with the concept that his brother may well have forgotten about him. Dismissed him, after taking something that had been conveniently there.

Why did he do it…?

Since he had been small, Itachi had always worked to make him see the bigger picture. That the world was not something entirely focused on him, and that meant he had to expand his reasoning beyond what he had any personal understanding of.

The only thing he understood was that, at the time, for a little while, Itachi had wanted him.

Outside of that…

…Wanted him distracted, exhausted enough that, even if he wanted to, there would be nothing Sasuke could have done to stop what he had in mind for their parents.

Eyes lidded heavily as his thoughts slipped off. Within a few hours, he would be away from this place. Away from this room, and away from the environment that was still pungent with memories.

Memories like when he had first grown suspicious of his brother. When he had uncovered that there was such a silent, mutual air between his brother and that dead man, Shisui.

“How long were you watching us?”

Curious eyes trailed over the thin figure that faded in and out of his nap. Long fingers shooed sweaty hair out of his little brother’s face, the color of ecstasy still in his face. A color that couldn’t be duplicated by anger or the fatigue of sports. It was something more defined, concentrating around eyes that were foggy and by comparison made his lips pale, the rest of his body splotched with essence and that flattering pink that reminded him of strawberry milk.

Sasuke’s cheeks bloated in resistance to the question, huffing as he looked away.

It made Itachi smile. Just a little bit. He afforded himself that as his brother’s vision was elsewhere. But when he collected himself, Itachi reached out to claim the sharp little chin and urge the other’s face towards his in silent demand for an answer.

Even with his face left to confront his brother, Sasuke found a way to take his eyes elsewhere. Embarrassment blended in to his features, struggling with how to answer the question. “A… a while. Not long…”

If he had watched for too long, he risked being too hard to move away from the crack in the doorway. Recalling how he had come across learning what he wanted made his eyes fall shut and attempted shying away from the grip. He could still remember how his mouth dried at watching the way his brother’s form surged with power as Shisui was blissfully helpless beneath him.

“Long enough…” the older speculated, lifting his head off his own hand to lean down and suckle at a sweat-salted collar bone. Breath just below that hitched, and he could feel blood flutter under his lacking gesture. Anything more and his little bite would remain longer than it had to. He pulled back, admiring the way Sasuke’s blood swarmed to his presence and speckled just under the milky canvas. Eyes flicked up to the way his brother’s complete, half-witted attention was on him. “Were you watching when I did that..?”

Today was such an amazing day. It late in the afternoon now, the pair of them suffocating in the thick stink of sex that he was sure would never air out now. Now it was the most his brother had ever spoken to him.

It was the best birthday he thought he could ever have.

A wooden nod emerged from him. Itachi’s eyes narrowed.

“I didn’t hear you…”

Eyes clamped shut, afraid that he was pushing the short patience his brother had bestowed him with. “Yeah. I… I was.”

Sasuke was such a shy creature. In earlier days, that was fine to deal with, as he had no problems with letting the boy get away with half-hearted and monotonous answers.

To him though, Sasuke wasn’t a boy anymore. He could never so innocently hold the title again.

It thrilled him to rob his baby brother of that.

And to know their parents could not deny it, either.

Possessiveness gripped him, sliding his hand on to a smaller ribcage and back, fingers dipping in to a soft spine and pulling the body against his. In all likelihood, he had only let the presence get so far away from him so their sweat could dry and the sauna that had become his own room wouldn’t weigh down on them so heavily.

He had moved them out of Sasuke’s room when he had untied little wrists. Moving on ahead of his brother allowed him to turn the tape recorder on, and methodically go about every single one of the fantasies that had been tallied and catalogued to this day.

It had been so cute, watching the younger Uchiha try to obey him when he had called, watery legs not helping him in the slightest to leave his own bed. He didn’t want to move. His legs hurt, and his ass especially hurt. His wrists ached, lifting one to inspect the way silk had burned an imprint in to on of them. Heat tinged his ears at recalling how his brother had impatiently surfaced in the doorway, come over and kissed it.

In the slightest Itachi had not minded fetching the newly-fucked bundle, carrying him to the bed they occupied now. Though it dissatisfied him to know their parents would no longer be able to directly hear every delicious moan and wail that emitted from his runty baby brother, it elated him to know he would just have to make Sasuke scream that much louder.

This place would be haunted with such agonizing delight when he was done.

Sasuke’s head fell as he flipped the lid of the suitcase down. It landed with a heavy clap of the metal lips hitting each other.

There was very little Sasuke could bring himself to pack. Mostly it was clothes, and he figured there were only so many he had that were worth bringing with him. After all, they were all things from his brother’s closet, and if he took them all, he feared that somehow they would lose their effect on him.

The only other thing inside was the cd that he had found in his brother’s mattress. At first, he had thought it was a music disk, but when he had gone to put it in his player, nothing happened. Upon inspecting the nameless disk in the computer, he had uncovered a hard copy of the information their father had worked on in his spare time, and his own research as well.

Things involving an organization called Akatsuki. Apparently, they were undermining the Yakuza, nothing more than a pack of businessmen with a goal of owning even those centuries-owned assets.

More than that though, its members were connected to great crimes all over this country and the surrounding ones.

In exchange for his charges of fraud and suspicious actions towards the government, Orochimaru had received protection from the police in identifying his own members.

And the only people that had heard the confession were his brother, father, and…

…Shisui.

Inky pools drifted to his wrist, clean and white. Yet… it always felt as if there was something strapped to it. Some fetter he could never take away, knowing his brother’s lips had been there. There to console his hurts, and so many other places that made him warm to think about.

”How much did you see?” That demanding question again. He already had a good idea of the answer, the way his brother’s faded arousal twitched to life, trapped under his thigh for Itachi straddling one leg.

But, he wanted to hear it. Had to hear it. Had to reconstruct the spine that he knew dwelled in his brother had turned in to sexed jelly in being crammed against the wall just a while ago. Deep down he held a satisfaction in his sibling’s stamina. It warmed him to know that, so long as he continued to challenge him and coerce him, Sasuke’s own limit would only be reached when Itachi would take ruthless hold of it.

Sasuke could only squirm as his neck was harassed with little bites, saliva and punctures amassed over his pulse as his brother expertly chewed away at it. Desperate to make it stop, he wailed and gripped at the damp tank top hoarding the measly sweat his brother had generated. “I swear! I didn’t see a lot!”

Parting with an annoyed moan in to salted flesh he stared down at his brother’s rosy face, then nuzzled in to stringy hair. His voice made Sasuke shiver when he spoke in to his ear. When he adjusted his weight, the other arched for some kind of freedom now that his member was trapped under an unbearably strong stomach.

“ ‘A lot’ varies from person to person. Do you think what we’ve done is a lot..?”

Questions from his brother always made him inadequate. Especially since his heart was still fluttering in the tax of screeching in to a muscled shoulder for being fucked out there in the hallway. If their parents had come home early, he could have died. As it was, he couldn’t feel his legs, even more now than when he had been first extracted from his own bed. His insides tingled, and his thighs were sticky. …More from his own mess than his brother’s.

It was something Sasuke couldn’t comprehend, not in his current state. How his brother could resist it so well, the need to release. Baffled him really. But he had to think that one could control themselves better with experience, and that was one reason he craved to prolong this experience.

Their parents did not simultaneously leave the house and leave his brother there very often. And the idea of ever stifling himself if they trysted while their parents were downstairs… The idea surfaced a weary moan from him as Itachi chewed on his ear. His whole body rattled when the voice tore in to him again after a vicious little bite at his hearing.

“I asked you a question, brat.”

“It’s… not… For you,” he sighed, withering as dark eyes looked elsewhere.

Even darker eyes blinked owlishly in their sexed stupor, lids heavy and his chin heavier as it settled in the white hollow of a shoulder to allow his breath a cooling effect on the sweated pulse in his brother’s neck. “And what’s that supposed to mean…?”

He didn’t like being uncomfortable around this guy. This guy he had wanted for… as long as he had been aware he could want someone. And to think about it made him jealous, even though he knew that now, Itachi belonged to him. Owned him, respectively. Now they were in the same bed that he had possessed someone Sasuke had never directly hated.

But he was getting closer to it.

“That… wasn’t the only time I saw… you two…”

“Yo~!” Sasuke peered over the lid of the cab’s trunk to spot bushy brown hair and red bandages, just in time to catch a sharp bark from somewhere around Kiba’s feet.

“…What are you doing here?” He hadn’t wanted to look at his possessions the whole ride to the train station, and only now did the suitcase rejoin him.

“Buzz at the station said you were finally skipping town. Like hell if I was missing that!” The wild smirk on his face remained plastered there as the other boy approached, fists diving in to the pockets of his parka.

The Uchiha had never understood it really, how the guy could stand wearing it in this heat. “You skipped school to play witness…?”

“Someone has to rub it in the face of that fanclub that they’ll need some new thing to wet their panties over.” Inky eyes soured at the idea, shooting the other a disgusted look to which Kiba only barked out a laugh. “I guess you better not tell anyone where you’re going, or you’ll just get lots of raunchy mail.”

The images just kept getting worse.

“Could you knock it off? I’m supposed to get sick when I’m moving.”

Sobered by a fading chuckle, the other teen inched himself closer to take a more serious note with the disgruntled Uchiha. “But, I got somethin’ else to tell you. That guy you’re leaving with, he’s bad news.”

“…I know,” he stated simply, reaching to collect the handle of his suitcase. “…I don’t care.”

Stiffening at his fresh spot of news falling dead, he snorted and sank weight in to the hip that was aligned with the dog below. “Well, as long as you don’t care… But, Sasuke…”

It was the first time he had heard his name from this guy since they were too old to cling to their mothers. For it he could only give a bored contribution of attention as sharp eyes exchanged.

“My old lady, and my sis – everyone on the force don’t like it. It’s not right for this place to not have one of you guys around. Hey--! What’re…?”

Kiba blinked at the disk shoved at him, the brunet bringing shut his suitcase once more. Sternly the older teen glared at him, collecting his baggage from the top of the trunk.

“I don’t like you.”

“Shit, like it wasn’t obvious.” As if to yield clues, the motley boy sniffed the disk. “What’s that got to do with this?”

Fisting his hip, he righted the baggage hanging from his other hand. “You practically work there, even if you don’t have a badge. I’ll get an address for you to mail a copy to.”

“For such a forward guy you don’t like answering my question huh?” To make point, he wagged the disk in his fingers.

“…That’s the last thing my father was working on. I… don’t want to continue his work.” Bitter eyes drifted away from the strangled expression getting to the other’s face. He only dimly heard the disk being put away in a pocket. “But, I don’t want to leave it unfinished, either. I don’t like you. That’s why I can depend on you.”

Lips scrunched defiantly. “Pretty fucked up logic you got there.”

A calculating look drifted out of him then, the dog boy’s shoulders falling at being disarmed by the way the Uchiha’s lips quirked. “I need someone back here that can help me dig around. You can dig can’t you, m—“

“Don’t even start,” he growled, Akamaru getting up to his fours to hackle as well. “That don’t make no sense, Uchiha. How do you know I won’t just take this and screw you?”

“Because it’s going to be pretty hard to screw someone that’s not here.”

Silence drifted between them, raven hair crested with victory and much more mangled hair wild with agitation.

“…You’re a pretty strange guy. I didn’t think we’d ever have a conversation even this long.”

Curious, he blinked. “Why’s that?”

“Because I always thought you were mute back in school, man. You are all, ‘I’m hot shit, and I don’t even stink, get a whiff of my greatness losers’.” Kiba’s hips stopped twisting around when the impersonation was over, cackling.

A sweatdrop trickled down his pale cheek. “Pretty contradictory…”

“Just like that logic of yours.”

“It’s easy to be betrayed by people you trust,” he stated flatly, his expression growing somber and heavy. Then, it grew more distant when his attention fixed on the other teen. “If I’m expecting you to betray me, you’ll do the opposite just to spite me.”

He wanted to contest that. Especially because it was right. Defeated, he formed a scowl and released a snort, chin kicking up defiantly and turning to leave. “The only way I’m mailing you back is if you send somethin’ cool. None of that postcard shit.” Akamaru was on his heels as he lifted a hand to wave as he left.

By the time he got back to the car, Sasuke was already navigating the inner terminals and meeting up with his ticket. Kiba grinned huge to the pair of sunglasses in the diver’s seat, of which only greeted him with a frigid, “You two talked for a long time.”

“Guess we did.” Rubbing the back of his head, he laughed and moved around to the passenger’s side. Only when the door shut and his pup had navigated to the back seats did he continue. Leaving this guy in suspense was always so entertaining. To enjoy the way Shino stewed with impatience, hands meshed behind his head and boots kicked up on the dashboard, the seat still reclined the way he had left it.

“Wanted to be pen pals before he gets all famous or some shit. Weird time to go making friends. I can kinda see why all those babes go for him though. He’s got that weird look in his eyes.”

“…They’re black, but they shine brightly.”

“Yeah. I kinda almost swooned over it, sorta. Guess it’s his charm or something.”

Shino turned the keys in the ignition and the jalopy came to life. “…Like the shell of a beetle.”

A queasy sensation built in the bottom of his stomach, eyeing his driver. “God, not you too.”


Leaving this place didn’t upset him in the slightest. How could it when… the person he wanted to be here with wasn’t around anymore? Sasuke drifted through people scurrying to their terminals, and the only word he could think to describe himself was… eager. On the outside he didn’t show it, a youth dressed like he was off to see important relatives that must see him already as an adult to wear his father’s hand-me-downs by the way they hung on him.

Well, not his father’s, anyway…

When he made it to his ticket’s cabin, he was still filled with restlessness that was like static on the television until the power was cut at spotting the pair already waiting for him in their seats. Kabuto was sat across from the other man, who had seemed to have his eyes fixated on the brunet ever since he had opened the door.

“There you are, Sasuke-kun. I would have thought you would be too apprehensive to leave your hometown so suddenly.” A smirk of surprised delight twisted across his features and gleamed in toxic eyes as he patted the empty span of cushion beside him. “I saved you the window.” It was not as if he wanted to watch the scenery drift by, anyway.

For the life of him, Sasuke couldn’t help but snap, “You’re not going to make me call you Uncle, are you?”

The response that came back said he had opened his mouth much too soon. “You may call me whatever you like…”

This guy… really had a nasty habit of making his skin crawl.

It was going to be a long ride. Feet shuffled, and he was about to sit next to Kabuto when he was shot a disinterested look behind the adjustment of lenses. The other hand went to settle his bag in to the empty space, smiling in that too serene way of his. “Sorry, Sasuke-kun, but I can’t put this up in the rack. It’s very fragile.”

“Then make him watch it.”

“I’m afraid I’m the one being paid for that task. It would be extremely rude. You see?”

With a low growl and a curl of his lip the Uchiha grudgingly approached the only available seat and dumped himself there, an equally weighted thud on the floor when his bag landed there at his feet.

“This is going to be your first time out of this sweet little town, isn’t it?” His inquiry was genuine, but there was always a motive behind it, hunting for the pallid reflection in the glass of his new… acquisition. “You didn’t bring a camera…? Not going to send pictures to your school friends?”

Quite unfair it would be to call Sasuke his new pet. The boy didn’t belong to him save in their contract. It would not be savoring to call the boy ‘his’.

Not until he was quite sure the owner that had up and left was well aware of what they had left behind.

Certainly, whoever this elegant, feral feline belonged to couldn’t be living here, or he would not be leaving with such detachment. Such release, even.

Orochimaru assumed that when one was in a prison, they were thankful to whoever had a key. That grin hadn’t fallen from his face in the slightest, even if the boy never met his face in the glass. Ignored him completely.

Ignored him even when he settled the full of his hand on the thigh of his slacks, giving an appreciative, appraising rub of his thumb along the outer hollow of his knee. Not the slightest twitch in brow or leg from the boy for it.

It was a nice start. And a long train ride.

Kabuto only adjusted his glasses before becoming needlessly busy on his digital assistant.

~*~*~*~*~*~

It was the worst kind of greeting Sasuke could have imagined. Not ten steps in to the studio and he was snatched at the chin by sharp nails and tendons that gripped him harsh.

The redhead only stood over him, scowling as she turned his face this way and that to send sharp needles up his neck from the stress. He scowled back. The feeling was mutual.

“Look at this little shit? He doesn’t even fight back. Can you believe what Orochimaru-sama’s digging out of the rat holes these days?”

Tayuya released him with a strong shove, but he didn’t topple. Instead he collected himself, and reached up to dab fingers on the cold spots where her fingers had been, seeing blood there.

“Oi, oi! Lookit that.” It was a man. No matter what the lipstick and the sagging hair on his eye made Sasuke want to think. A duplicate voice sounded behind him, making him stiffen. Two pairs of hands grabbed at him, one fist on his wrist and an arm around his neck as bodies closed in.

“He’s dressed like some altar boy. He got a real young one this time.”

“Little bitch doesn’t even shave. Heh, Tayuya’s got more of a mustache than he does.”

“Shut the fuck up!” barked from the sidelines as she pistoled her fist at them threateningly.

The twin leering down at him grinned lecherously. It had to be from the fact his other half was getting familiar with the curves of Sasuke’s back keeping him close by the middle. They both came to a sudden stop, and black eyes widened when the grip on his belly came away to free the knife tucked in to his belt.

“Ukon, look at this! Hehe… Altar boy thinks he’s a boyscout!” Which meant the one grappled to him had to be Sakon, who tossed the knife over to the girl that snatched it from the air.

The butterfly knife came to life in her fingers, giving a low whistle. “He keeps it greased up pretty good. Wonder if he’s got anything else greased up like that?”

From the guitar rack the largest of them approached, extending his large hand to her for the weapon. “Tayuya… You shouldn’t say such vulgar things.”

Readying the blade in her grip to stab the other, she shot him a fowled look. “Shut the fuck up huh? We’re just having fun.”

“If he’s going to be our vocalist, we should at least get along. I’m sure this is leaving a bad impression.”

“Hoho~! Look at this, niisan!”

Sasuke’s senses were rattled by the term, remembering when he had someone to croon to like that. As of yet, he had offered no resistance, and even still when the strange hand came away from his pocket and freed a thick metal stick.

The older gave a lecherous stare in to black eyes, taking the stick from his little brother and giving it a flick from his wrist. Sasuke didn’t blanch when it expanded to the full reach of a baton right near his cheek.

“Such a naughty altar boy. Dressed all sweet like that thinking you can come in here looking like a badass and you don’t even trust us enough to come in here unarmed? You little shit.”

Tayuya attempted to step up, twisting the steel knife around in her fingers when she was grabbed at the shoulder by the tubby one.

“Why the fuck does he get to be the lead anyway? He ain’t shit to Kimimaro. At least he looked fuckable. That one looks like he’d break.”

That name was the only one he couldn’t place. For the sake of trying he tried to put the name to the big one only looking on, but it didn’t fit. No one in this group had that name, as far as the bastard had informed him.

“He’s not even any fun,” Sakon giggled in his ear, taking a rough jerk of the Uchiha’s hips. Twisting away did no good, because the older one closed in and smashed him between larger bodies. “Maybe the boss already broke him in.”

The thought made him gag, face twisting up to keep the image from boring in. All the others may have misinterpreted it intentionally, because there was laughter all around him.

“Heh, the little bitch likes being teased, looks like.” Ukon leaned in to drag the flat of his tongue on ruby crescents in the younger cheek, only to screech and jump away.

“You fucker!” The meaty fist ground in to her shirt before she could lunge.

Sakon only stared with sick amusement at his brother’s cursing while the man clutched his ear. Even more when he caught Sasuke grinning about his triumphant rebellion. “I think he’s kind of cute.”

“I think he looks like a woman.”

“More than you, even?”

“Shut the fuck up, fag.”

In the background, Ukon was screaming about being bitten, throwing the baton away in his rage.

A huge grin lofted her features as she tossed her head to scatter copper strands. “That’s what you get. I hope he bites your piece off too.”

“Heh, maybe that’s why you don’t like him then.” The arm around the younger boy’s throat came away to sink a fist in ebon hair and give his face a parallel to the ceiling. “He’s prettier than a bitch, and he takes it like one too. See? Probably let me grind him in to dust. Maybe he likes an audience, huh?”

They were starting to get on his nerves, managing a smirk through the pain jumping across his scalp and down his back. “Maybe,” was his only agreement, reaching a freed hand up to the one in his hair and soothing his grip around a wrist, thumb massaging the tattooed inner flesh. His rear burrowed in to the hips that returned the mistaken affection, feet shifting his balance.

Another scream drifted through the studio when his thumb dug in, taking the limb hostage and pulling the body over his planted foot. Sakon crumpled over the knee that came full force in to his gut, and for it Sasuke gave no second thought to approach his baton that had gone flying in to a thicket of wires.

“But, I just let it happen because there wasn’t anything there to worry about.”

Tayuya gave a sharp laugh, fisting her hip and tossing the closed knife back to him. “Maybe he’s not an altar boy after all. But, he’s definitely not going on the stage looking that fuckin’ prissy. You shits should take him shopping.”

What was it with women complaining about how he dressed himself?

“I’m gonna kill him,” Ukon snarled, at last able to pull his hand away from his woundless ear and its colony of piercings. “And then I’m gonna fuck him.”

“Stop being sick and get him behind a mic. Let’s see how he squeals.”

~*~*~*~*~*~

His little sex furnace was such a voyeur.

A questioning, “Oh?” sounded from him as he began to chew his way through the slab of neck worn tasteless from previous nibbling. Embarrassment constricted his throat, managing a nod Itachi could neither see nor feel.

Fingers circled sensitive nub made pert in cooling sweat, tugging fiercely for an answer that only came as a happy moan at first.

“I...” It was the most humiliating thing to admit, throat dry and cracked and parched from screaming and sex and the pressure of being confronted. Staring at the ceiling afforded him some strength, sinking fingers in to hair barely ruined by sweat.

Itachi was quickly learning that his brother easily opened up at the prospect of stopping, hands securing on the smaller frame that expanded and shrank breathlessly, shivering from his system done with cooling down.

He was ready to go again, and didn’t seem to have a clue. At this rate, Sasuke was more likely to pass out in the middle of it all, without some kind of reprieve rather than deny his always-ready brother and fall behind.

It was perfect.

”I… was really mad at you, doing that instead of coming down to my birthday party…”

Barely eight and Sasuke had already experienced jealousy. At nine, depression with his brother’s constant successes. Melancholy and something one could only call misery. At the time, that was the best word for it.

But it was only after the final, parting gift Itachi had left him could that word truly shine in his brother.

It was one thing to take away a boy’s innocence when they were so willing to give everything to you.

It was quite another to tear it to pieces and not leave a single trace after stuffing oneself.

Ringing clearly in his ears, there was always a constant, if not randomly memorized moan or scream that he had created. It was something beautiful, to create such music from a rather spectacular instrument.

His heart thumped cold against the back of his ribs though, when it occurred to him he wasn’t hearing the throes of old days.

That voice was here. Here. In the now. In his space. Itachi’s head snapped up from glancing the menu to check the rest of the restaurant.

…No one else seemed to notice. Realization gripped him and took him back to his senses, eyes blankly taking in the rugged man sat across from him that only stared with beady eyes and that permanent, crooked grin.

“Something wrong, ‘Tachi-san?”

There was another distorted sigh in the speakers, amidst ceremony drums and an electric guitar, a sound that traveled straight to his cock.

His arousal had not been this sudden and off-setting in his lifetime. What appetite he had gained with coming in here to a place with good food had suddenly become bottomless, and he was sure there was not enough water in his glass to bring life back to his tongue bloated with the need to moisten his lips and unable to do so.

He was bottomless at the few, faint, haughty words that drifted through the melody. “Hating falling for you…”

Kisame blinked at the rasp of, “Nothing,” his partner gave him, watching as the younger man casually (well, he noticed Itachi was trying to be casual – the guy looked like his spine had turned to wood from a broom handle being broken off in his ass) inched himself to the edge of the seat and slid off.

“Order something for me.”

“You know I’ll just order something spicy,” he cracked, amused despite how skeptical he was of the other’s sudden collapse in behavior. Others wouldn’t notice, but in his few years of being with this guy, this was the most disheveled he had ever been.

There was no response. …No argument, rather.

…Itachi hated spicy stuff. He watched as the Uchiha stalked through the tables, possessed to make it to the bathrooms.

…Itachi hated public bathrooms.

“Already got a bad stomach and we haven’t even ordered…” Chuckling, he flipped through the menu to hunt for the worst thing he could possibly find to make that guy eat.

If he thought he needed to use the bathroom now…

But, Itachi didn’t go to the bathroom. He arched over the jukebox that was en route to the stalls, flipping through the pages of albums and not able to read a single one due to the heat in his coils. It seared and ate away at him, raw and real and inflicted by such a miniscule thing as some song in the speakers.

He knew that voice. It was more refined, cultivated – gorgeously manipulated, and he knew exactly why.

Sasuke was growing up. Sasuke wanted to be heard. Old enough to be needed. Had to make him suffer without even being there.

“Falling for this hate of you…”

There.

Another needy, heady, lengthy breath of notes disguised as compliment to its surroundings.

Painted nails ached to dig in to the glass with no success as he stared down at the success of his seekings. There, on the album, was his brother’s face. Heart-shaped and sharp with youth and pride and glowing like marble in twilight with the studio lighting. Carrying bandages on cheek and chin and brow and what had to be make-up bruises trapping coals that lit from the inside to reflect nothing.

“The only way I’ll be rid of you…”

A hearth that invited everyone to bask in him, but no one could touch or he would only feed on them. They glittered with something only the likes of Itachi would recognize.

Hair mangled like too many hands had grabbed it, long enough to float roughish on his head rather than be a crown of rebellion. His knees has melted some time ago, sheer will keeping him upright as eyes fixed briefly on the slope of his brother’s throat decorated with painted bruises like finger prints and ribbons of scratches to match how the tie wanted to fall off after almost strangling him. On that crisp shirt he could see buttons missing, exposing the shadows of a maturing structure and only a taste of collar bone that was bruised by teeth.

There was a distinguishing contrast of red amidst the monotone picture, bright crimson that was in the scratches and splotched on the front of the shirt.

That shirt was ruined because there was no faking the gash that plumped his brother’s bottom lip and stood in relief against snowy features as he no doubt chewed the inside of the undamaged side.

If his mouth wasn’t so dry he would have been drooling. Drooling with the craving that made his physical appetite pale to his erotic one.

With that and the drool of an animal made berserk with the idea that Sasuke had seduced someone in to striking him. Seduced someone with this voice he had obtained that knifed him at not being the one to hear it first.

Marring him like Itachi never could have done the same.

“…and to kill me, too. Cuz I can’t stand the thought of you. Of being without you…”

He had been so trapped in his discovery that pieces of the song had eluded him. His forehead connected with the top of the glass dome as he tried to regain himself. Beneath the coat of their organization, he was suffering with hot and the full knowledge that his pants were moist.

For the life of him, he couldn’t read the title of the album through eyes blurred and crimson with fantasy.

Memorizing such a thing was unnecessary, he supposed It was not a face he was likely to forget, now that he knew what it looked like.

Now that he knew how far his brother would go for his attention.

Now that he knew his brother had learned the concept of hatred.

And tempered it in to that beautiful expression of his to craft revenge.

…He would have to teach that boy a lesson. A reward for learning so well.

Giving those eyes to the entire world. That voice. Their secret.

That passion belonged to him, dammit. And he was going to reclaim it.

If he had to kill that little whore to do it. If he couldn’t be the first, he would be the last.