Peculiarities

Chapter 2

Itachi's legs stumble through the porch and into his home, exhaustion lacing every one of his steps. He had only finished a B-rank, but his partner had still insisted on running back to the village at top speed, rambling on about how he would do five hundred backflips if he failed to outpace Itachi.

Itachi, while not lacking in that area, was decidedly not a taijutsu expert.

... But he was an Uchiha, and Uchiha were raised to not back down from challenges.

Itachi lets out a soft chuckle at his foolishness. The expressiveness of Maito Gai was an invigorating and physically taxing presence on missions. In a roundabout way, Itachi could understand why Gai and his former taichou were friends. The man was odd, but compelling.

Itachi plods down the hall, making sure to take off his sandals and put the spare slippers on his worn feet. Being able to walk back from a mission without taking off his ANBU armor was a strange sensation that didn't lessen as he reached his bedroom shoji.

Itachi immediately straightens and blinks at what he sees.

"Sasuke," He begins, wary, "What are you doing in my room?"

Sasuke blinks back in surprise, immediately jumping on the tatami from his perch on the windowsill, the sunset behind his frame casting warm shadows on his visage.

"I can't sleep. Can I stay with you tonight?" Sasuke asks. His tone is so unequivocally childlike that it can't help but awaken some primal parental instinct in Itachi's brain, even as the muscles in his arms twitch with memories of the night before and the invasion of his space.

"Of course," He automatically agrees. Itachi steps into the tatami barefoot, carefully placing the slippers next to the shoji's wooden frame. The folded futon is easily pulled out from his closet, and Itachi's skin itches from feeling Sasuke's eyes on the back of his neck.

He wordlessly makes the sheets, as he's done countless times before, and climbs in — too tired to change into nightclothes. Besides, he'd always made it a policy to shower and change at the barracks right after a mission. Anything to not stay a moment longer in the stifling compound.

He makes room in the futon for Sasuke to climb in. Sasuke was still small enough that they didn't need to bring an extra one, yet.

"Tiring day at the academy?" He asks as his little brother delicately steps over.

Sasuke yawns as he climbs in, limbs awkwardly sprawling into the comforter. "You could say that, Nii-san," He mumbles, breathing growing fainter as he snuggles up against Itachi's front.

Itachi stares at Sasuke's hair for a moment, feeling the slow rise and fall of his younger brother's shoulders, letting his mind wander as the silence of the evening washes over them.

Itachi curls his body around Sasuke's, breathing in the faint, unfamiliar hints of smoke and copper, and sleeps.

--

"Get up!" A familiar voice hisses.

Itachi pulls away from Sasuke's form and tiredly squints up at Shisui, who looms over him with a serious expression.

"Come with me, it's urgent," Shisui says. He shinshuns outside, the breeze from his momentum knocking back Itachi's hair as he scrambles to extract himself from the futon and follow Shisui to the rooftop.

"What is it?" He asks, desperation coating his words. So many things could have gone wrong, and Itachi is loathed to think of any of them happening.