“You’re supposed to be a genius.”
Itachi scowled. Lenient he might be with the Hyuuga, but it was not Neji who held any power in Akatsuki. “The circumstances—“
“I don’t want to hear it.” Each word was clipped, spat out almost. Neji was upset, and Itachi knew it. “You should have foreseen that possibility.”
“How was I to know the kind of jutsu the kyuubi brat would think up?” Itachi replied. His own anger was rising, and though he didn’t want to subject his prisoner-cum-secret lover to it, if the damn boy kept pushing like he did— “That hurts. Stop pressing so hard.”
Neji apologized tersely and finished dressing the wound more gently. His feelings alternated between grabbing the outcast Uchiha in a tight embrace and never mind the wounds, and using strategically placed strikes to numb his face so Neji could pummel it. “I was worried, damn it. It’s not usual to see even the Leader looking worried.” He moved on to the next slash. Dirt had been ground into this one, almost as if the force of the blast had knocked Itachi onto his back and pushed him across the ground—sure enough, there was a long, bloody scrape a few inches below that. Akatsuki’s medic was gone, killed in a fit of pique from one of the other members, and they had yet to find anyone else willing to live in a den of the world’s most hated criminals.
Dipping a piece of sterilized gauze in an antiseptic solution, Neji started on cleaning this wound, too. Wind chakra cut, sliced right through skin. Itachi was lucky the heavy material of the cloak he wore had saved him from the worst of it, otherwise the muscles in his back, arms and abdomen would have been torn beyond the repair of anyone but a medic-nin. Neji would have left the compound and convinced Sakura to come with him by will or by force, for the sake of someone he’d come to—
Neji paused in his delicate cleaning. Love? He thought. When did that—
“Is something wrong?” Itachi asked. His voice was sardonic now.
“No, nothing,” Neji said quietly. He wet the gauze again and kept cleaning.
“You’re lying.”
“I am not lying, Uchiha Itachi.”
“Yes, you are. You just used my full name. That’s not something you do unless you’re trying to cover for something.”
Am I that easy to read? “Naruto’s come far.”
“His new jutsu is extremely powerful—gale-force winds with the cutting power of the Rasengan. I admit even I was more than a little impressed. And it’s specific to him, and requires his huge chakra reserves, so the usefulness of my copying it with the Sharingan is nothing.”
“Amazing,” Neji replied. “I never thought he could make it.”
“Well, he did. And apparently Kisame-san and I were the guinea pigs for it.”
The wound was clean, and Neji reluctantly began bandaging it. Just the scrape to clean next, and then he’d have to keep his hands to himself until they were back in the room. “You still should have been able to avoid it.”
Faster than the eye could follow he was pulled around to Itachi’s front, hands held over his head. For a moment his lover’s dark eyes sparkled with anger and annoyance, and then he was pulled forward into a tight grasp. His head fit into the curve of Itachi’s bare shoulder; the Uchiha smelled of antiseptic and stone.
Startled, Neji tried to back away. “If someone sees us like this, they’ll know we’re—“
“No one will come through that door,” Itachi said quietly. Neji felt him nosing through his hair, like Itachi was smelling him.
“I don’t want to be used to attack you.”
“They wouldn’t dare attack me.” There was no pride or boast in Itachi’s voice, only a cold factuality. “They need me here. I am their trump card for those self-righteous friends of yours in Konoha.”
Absently, Neji stroked the hair that fell over Itachi’s shoulder as he listened. It was soft and as long as his own; split at the ends from lack of proper trimming. It wasn’t as though a missing-nin and his hostage could just walk into any barbershop in any ninja country without immediately being attacked by the local hunter organization. It would be madness for them to even try; normalcy was something the Hyuuga had left behind when he had come to follow Itachi, and the day-to-day insanity had long since ceased to bother him at all.
Two missing-nins, Neji thought. We’d give the poor shopkeeper a heart attack.
“I should finish dressing these,” he said. Itachi released him and Neji went back to cleaning the long scrape. Thinking so much about his old companions made him a little homesick—well, more than a little, a lot—and like he had so many times before, he wondered if it was at all worth it.
Itachi did not promise him power; Neji already had it. Itachi did not promise him affection; he couldn’t give it. Akatsuki members had no heart, no soul, with the possible exception of Tobi; otherwise they were killing machines. They did their duty ruthlessly and emotionlessly. More times than he could count Neji had woke up to Itachi undressing in the dim light of a single lamp, covered in blood that was not his own. Those nights Itachi would sleep curled on his side away from Neji, as if he didn’t want the Hyuuga to see his animalistic bloodlusts. Neji wondered why, as he applied a salve that would keep the wound clean and facilitate healing, the Uchiha bothered to do this. He’d drawn the younger man here when Neji was a jounin; there was already blood on his hands.
He didn’t know Itachi did this to protect what little innocence he had left.
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Chapter notes: seriously? Itachi + WAFF = BRAIN BREAKAGE. But ItaNeji's been gnawing at me lately (and delaying me from writing more chapters on Illusion, dammit) and I had to throw this out to you bloodthirsty readers. XD
Usual disclaimers apply.