...wrote this a while ago...
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Uchiha Sasuke knew he was about to die.
It was a curiously peaceful feeling, grey and cold and quiet and as inevitable as the frost just before dawn.
Six years isn't so long a time to say, but when it's half as much life as you'd had at the start of it, it's a very long time, indeed, to live. Long enough that even the quietest, most subtle whisper would come clear, even if only by its constancy.
Subtle, Orochimaru was -not-.
When he was twelve, his brother's frozen face and hateful eyes had lurked out of the darkness every time he closed his eyes. When he was twelve, anything he could do, anything at all to make that monster -pay- for what he had done to their family had seemed needful and more than. When he was twelve, he hadn't known how rare it was to friend a friend as loyal as Naruto, or a love as pure as Sakura's. When he was twelve, he had still been able to remember his mother's face.
When he was twelve, Sasuke had realized long ago, he had been a fucking -idiot-.
He had known this day was coming ever since the moment when he took the fruit from the devil's hand, and known even then that it was a step he could never take back, never avoid.
In retrospect, the manipulation was obvious - every word, every action carefully calculated to draw the greatest response from that stupid little boy's gaping wounds, and the seal's poison drowning everything good and blocking every path that led away from the abyss - but the worst thing was that, when he lay in bed waiting for sleep, he could never escape the knowledge that none of Orochimaru's manipulation had been neccessary.
If his eyes had been wide open, he would still have made the same mistake.
A Leaf raid and an ill-timed mission had brought him another three years - but now that time was up, and the twisting ropes and whisps of chakra snarled and danced around his body and Orochimaru's current shell. The intensity of the ritual was enough to disrupt the iron control the second-level seal had held over him the entire time since its activation, but that had been anticipated and he was bound tightly, far too much so to have a chance to disrupt the ceremony.
But that was all right. He hadn't planned to, anyway.
Despite all its power, the curse seal was not, in and of itself, intelligent. It did not know treason or rationalization, did not truly sift its victim's thoughts - it could only view, and react to, its wearer's own awareness of his orders.
And Orochimaru had forgotten to forbid Sasuke to booby-trap his own body. The complex web of ninjutsu he had woven through his own body over the last four years was only barely stable - the shock of the power involved in his 'master's' transfer would disrupt the balance and start the cascade into ruin. At the very longest, the process might take six months, more likely four.
He had wanted to revive his clan. He had wanted to kill his brother. He had wanted to see Sakura's smile again, or hear the Dead-last's whining voice.
But he'd seen the wreckage his former teammates had left behind in their other confrontations with the Akatsuki, and knew that Itachi's obsession would inevitably make the nukenin doom himself to the same end. He knew that they'd be happy with each other, even if he couldn't be there to see it.
It wasn't what he would have picked for his life - not even close - but he supposed that, given his sins, what he'd done would be more than enough.
Sasuke smiled as the ritual came to an end.
Blackness.
...needless to say, waking up again afterwards was something of a shock.
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"Puripuri puripuri... Bang!"
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Uchiha Sasuke knew he was about to die.
It was a curiously peaceful feeling, grey and cold and quiet and as inevitable as the frost just before dawn.
Six years isn't so long a time to say, but when it's half as much life as you'd had at the start of it, it's a very long time, indeed, to live. Long enough that even the quietest, most subtle whisper would come clear, even if only by its constancy.
Subtle, Orochimaru was -not-.
When he was twelve, his brother's frozen face and hateful eyes had lurked out of the darkness every time he closed his eyes. When he was twelve, anything he could do, anything at all to make that monster -pay- for what he had done to their family had seemed needful and more than. When he was twelve, he hadn't known how rare it was to friend a friend as loyal as Naruto, or a love as pure as Sakura's. When he was twelve, he had still been able to remember his mother's face.
When he was twelve, Sasuke had realized long ago, he had been a fucking -idiot-.
He had known this day was coming ever since the moment when he took the fruit from the devil's hand, and known even then that it was a step he could never take back, never avoid.
In retrospect, the manipulation was obvious - every word, every action carefully calculated to draw the greatest response from that stupid little boy's gaping wounds, and the seal's poison drowning everything good and blocking every path that led away from the abyss - but the worst thing was that, when he lay in bed waiting for sleep, he could never escape the knowledge that none of Orochimaru's manipulation had been neccessary.
If his eyes had been wide open, he would still have made the same mistake.
A Leaf raid and an ill-timed mission had brought him another three years - but now that time was up, and the twisting ropes and whisps of chakra snarled and danced around his body and Orochimaru's current shell. The intensity of the ritual was enough to disrupt the iron control the second-level seal had held over him the entire time since its activation, but that had been anticipated and he was bound tightly, far too much so to have a chance to disrupt the ceremony.
But that was all right. He hadn't planned to, anyway.
Despite all its power, the curse seal was not, in and of itself, intelligent. It did not know treason or rationalization, did not truly sift its victim's thoughts - it could only view, and react to, its wearer's own awareness of his orders.
And Orochimaru had forgotten to forbid Sasuke to booby-trap his own body. The complex web of ninjutsu he had woven through his own body over the last four years was only barely stable - the shock of the power involved in his 'master's' transfer would disrupt the balance and start the cascade into ruin. At the very longest, the process might take six months, more likely four.
He had wanted to revive his clan. He had wanted to kill his brother. He had wanted to see Sakura's smile again, or hear the Dead-last's whining voice.
But he'd seen the wreckage his former teammates had left behind in their other confrontations with the Akatsuki, and knew that Itachi's obsession would inevitably make the nukenin doom himself to the same end. He knew that they'd be happy with each other, even if he couldn't be there to see it.
It wasn't what he would have picked for his life - not even close - but he supposed that, given his sins, what he'd done would be more than enough.
Sasuke smiled as the ritual came to an end.
Blackness.
...needless to say, waking up again afterwards was something of a shock.
==================================================================================
===============================================
"Puripuri puripuri... Bang!"