For the next two hours, Sasuke paced the length of their dorm room, one palm wrapped so tight around his phone that the joints popped with every flex. The room looked exactly as it always did—Naruto's side a monument to chaos, Sasuke's an exercise in obsessive discipline—but a new, invisible geometry divided the space: everything north of the window belonged to anticipation and dread, everything south to the slow, magnetic draw that was Naruto sprawled on his bed, watching.
Naruto tried not to make a show of it. He scrolled through a feed of dog memes, half-laughed, rolled to his other side, and then peeked back again. But every three minutes, his eyes cut to Sasuke, mapping the familiar figure: black t-shirt stretched over a spine wound tighter than piano wire, jawline blade-sharp, lips compressed into a line so thin it could have been drawn by a draftsman. Occasionally, Sasuke would stop at the mirror above the desk, finger-comb his hair with surgical precision, and examine his own face with the cold appraisal of someone searching for cracks in a freshly set wall.
On the third circuit, Sasuke detoured to the bathroom, opened the cabinet, and checked the shelf where Naruto's stash of suppressants now lived in a neat, alphabetized row. He closed the cabinet, waited a beat, opened it again, as if a second glance might change the outcome. The pattern repeated at the nightstand and the window.
By the time Sasuke started on his fifth lap, Naruto couldn't take it anymore.
"You're going to wear a trench in the floor," he said, sitting up and swinging his legs off the bed.
Sasuke didn't pause, but his hands stilled against his sides. "The meeting isn't until one," he replied, voice flat, a hint of static undercutting the words. "There's no point in getting there early and waiting like an idiot."
Naruto's eyes traced the rigid line of Sasuke's back, the way his shoulder blades pushed against his shirt like they might tear through. With a sigh, he hauled himself off the bed and padded across the room. His arms found their way around Sasuke's middle, fingers locking at his back. Against his chest, he could feel Sasuke's heart hammering. "You gonna tell me what's eating you?" he murmured against the fabric.
Sasuke exhaled, the tension in his shoulders giving way like a dam breaking. His arms found their way around Naruto, and he allowed his chin to rest atop the mess of blond hair. "Something doesn't feel right about this," he murmured, his voice stripped of its usual armor. "What if we're walking straight into exactly what they want?"
Naruto pulled back, his blue eyes searching Sasuke's face. "Then don't go," he said, voice low and serious. "If something feels off to you, it probably is." His fingers tightened briefly against Sasuke's arms before dropping away.
Sasuke's jaw clenched tight enough to ache. Part of him wanted to abandon the whole thing—stay here, forget Itachi existed. But the thought rang hollow. He'd been running from this confrontation for years. "No," he said finally, his voice steadier than he felt. "I have to go. Trap or not. But you're staying here."
Naruto flopped back onto his bed with a theatrical sigh. "Yeah, yeah. I'll be right here when you get back, waiting like some loyal dog." He thumbed open his phone, the blue glow illuminating his face as he settled in for another mindless scroll through videos that would make the minutes pass faster than his own anxious thoughts could.
Sasuke scanned the room one final time before crossing to Naruto's bed. Feeling the shadow fall across his screen, Naruto glanced up. Without a word, Sasuke leaned down, his lips meeting Naruto's in a kiss that was barely more than a whisper against skin. Heat bloomed across Naruto's cheeks, his heart stuttering despite all the times they'd done this before. Sasuke pulled back just enough to murmur, "Don't leave. Pick up if I call."
Naruto snapped a mock salute, his lips quirking into that ridiculous grin. Sasuke paused at the door, rolled his eyes, and left without another word.
—
Sasuke arrived early, because of course he did. The café was the one with exposed brick and a reputation for not asking questions about what students did with their laptops at the corner tables. It was neither too trendy nor too faded, the kind of place where both faculty and undergrads could pretend not to notice each other. Sasuke bypassed the host, cut a silent path along the far wall, and selected a seat in the corner. Back to the brick, view of both the main entrance and the side door, nothing behind him but dead air and his own heartbeat.
He scanned the room with methodical precision. There were three other occupied tables: a pair of Beta girls sharing a tablet and whispering behind oversized mugs; a trio of Alpha boys, all bulk and bravado, arguing over protein macros; and a lone woman, her face half-obscured by a scarf, reading something dense and technical. The hum of conversation was just enough to mask the hiss of the espresso machine and the occasional slam of a portafilter.
Sasuke sat, hands flat on the tabletop, phone facedown. He didn't check the time. He didn't have to. Instead, he watched the reflections in the front window, every movement mapped to a name and potential threat. The first time the door swung open, he looked up, tension coiling and then receding as a pair of grad students shuffled past, arguing about lab access. The second time, his pulse jumped a fractional beat—then stilled.
Itachi stepped into the café like he owned the oxygen in the room. He wore a black turtleneck under a battered gray peacoat, dark hair pulled into a low, utilitarian ponytail. The resemblance was so complete it made Sasuke's teeth ache—same bone structure, same eyes, but where Sasuke was all sharp edges and compressed rage, Itachi looked worn thin, like a photograph left in the sun too long.
Itachi didn't hesitate. He located Sasuke in a single, sweeping glance and crossed the floor with surgical grace. Every step was measured, unhurried. He reached the table, paused, and—after a beat too long—slid into the seat opposite.
"Hello, little brother."
Sasuke kept his face blank. "You're late."
Itachi smiled, but it was more a contraction of muscle than an expression. "I waited outside for a few minutes. You're always early to these things."
Sasuke didn't answer. A server materialized, blinking at the tension. She set down two waters, then hovered. "Would you like anything to drink?"
"Black coffee," both brothers said, in perfect unison. The server flinched, nodded, and retreated.
For a moment, neither spoke. Sasuke watched Itachi's hands—long, clean-fingered, the nails trimmed to a uniform bluntness—rest lightly on the tabletop. No wedding ring, no jewelry, no marks.
Itachi broke the silence. "You look well."
Sasuke ignored the pleasantry. "Why did you agree to meet?"
Itachi studied his brother with the same detachment he used to apply to dissecting things—frogs, equations, the boundaries of trust. "You're ready to listen now."
A muscle worked in Sasuke's jaw. "So talk."
Their coffees arrived. Itachi thanked the server with a nod, then cradled the mug in both hands, as if the heat could fill some cavity he'd long ago resigned to emptiness.
Itachi's fingers traced the rim of his mug. "I've been trying to reach you for years," he said, voice low enough that only Sasuke could hear. "The things they've hidden from you—from both of us—run deeper than you can imagine."
Sasuke's voice cut in, a thin blade: "Then tell me."
Itachi didn't flinch. "I didn't kill our parents, Orochimaru did."
Sasuke's fingers curled around his own mug, knuckles whitening. "I saw the security logs. The door was locked from the inside."
"You saw what Obito wanted you to see. The truth is more complicated."
Sasuke's face was a study in containment: eyes level, lips a straight line, but beneath the surface, the old war raged on—childhood loyalty versus the corrosion of grief.
Itachi's fingers tightened around his mug. "I knew Orochimaru was conducting experiments off the books. I'd seen enough to suspect, but when you came to me that night—" His voice faltered. "When you told me what he'd done to you personally, it changed everything. I never imagined he'd target my own brother."
Sasuke's fingers tightened around his cup, then loosened, then tightened again, as if his hands couldn't decide whether to crush the ceramic or let it go. The nightmare from that time still cut deep, but now doubt sliced alongside it, two blades twisting in the same wound.
Itachi took a breath. "Our parents suspected something was wrong with the research. I confirmed it. I showed them evidence of human experimentation, test subjects brought in from out of state. They believed me."
Sasuke remembered the late-night whispers, the times when his parents would argue in the kitchen, voices too low for him to catch, but the vibrations traveled up through the floorboards anyway. He'd press his ear to the cold wood, desperate to hear more, then retreat to his bed, angry at himself for caring, for wanting to believe they were protecting him rather than hiding something terrible from him.
"Itachi, they said you were on drugs."
Itachi actually laughed, a bitter, rueful sound. "Yes. That was the story Obito and Orochimaru spread, to cover the fact that I was collecting evidence." He sipped his coffee. "Once our parents knew, they made plans to go public. I begged them to wait until I could copy the full data set. They agreed, for my sake. The next night, they were dead."
Sasuke set his mug down so hard that some of the liquid sloshed onto the table.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Sasuke's voice was a growl, low and shaking.
Itachi looked down at his hands, a single muscle twitching in his left cheek. "You were twelve. You believed what you were told. And after the first year, Obito made it clear that if I tried to contact you, he'd—"
"He'd what?" Sasuke demanded.
"—he'd kill you, too," Itachi finished, soft but unyielding.
The memory of Obito's hand on his shoulder, the forced smile at the funeral, returned in a rush—that same hand that had passed him tissues, that had signed his school forms for years after. Sasuke's stomach flipped with nausea even as his throat tightened with something dangerously close to grief. His breath caught between rejection and recognition.
Sasuke's throat tightened around words he'd rehearsed a hundred times in the shower. "The police report said you left a confession. A recording on Dad's computer."
Itachi's denial was simple, unadorned. "I didn't." His dark eyes fixed on Sasuke's face, cataloging every flicker of emotion—the war between doubt and hope, the grief that had calcified over a decade. Sasuke stared back, searching his brother's expression for any trace of the practiced deception he'd witnessed in Obito's office weeks ago, and found none. The café narrowed to just this: the soft scrape of ceramic mugs against tile, and the persistent throb behind Sasuke's temples.
Itachi's fingers tightened around his mug until his knuckles went white, then suddenly released. "I've spent ten years gathering proof," he said, his voice catching slightly before hardening again. "I work for a group that—" He stopped, looked away, then back at Sasuke with eyes that couldn't decide between rage and despair. "The thing that murdered our parents isn't human, Sasuke. Not anymore. It's a weapon wearing flesh, and I've dedicated my life to stopping it."
Sasuke's hands trembled. The truth crashed through him like a wave breaking against stone—ten years of hatred suddenly redirected, leaving him hollow and raw. He stared at his brother across the table, seeing him truly for the first time: the exhaustion etched into the corners of his eyes, the grief lines bracketing his mouth. Not the monster of his nightmares but a man who'd carried an impossible burden alone. Something hot and painful expanded in Sasuke's chest, making it hard to breathe.
Sasuke held Itachi's gaze for a long time, unwilling to blink first. "If what you're saying is true, I want proof," he said. "I want more than just a story."
Itachi's eyes didn't so much as flicker. He reached into his battered messenger bag and drew out a battered black folio, its edges softened by years of handling. He opened it with practiced care, laying the contents out on the tiny table between them.
First, a stack of photographs—color prints, their edges curling. Itachi spread them in a loose arc: images of what looked like a medical facility, but not any hospital Sasuke had ever seen. Rows of beds, each occupied by a figure with their face obscured by a black bar; vials of blood labeled only with numbers; a close-up of a young woman's arm, punctured over and over along the vein. Some of the images were out of focus, as if taken in a hurry or at a distance.
Sasuke reached out, hands trembling despite his best effort. He flipped through the photos, pulse thrumming. The scenes were clinical but the details screamed: restraints, bruises, a scar in the shape of a registry implant cut from the flesh.
"What is this," Sasuke asked, voice barely more than a whisper.
"Orochimaru's original lab," Itachi answered. "The one the police never found. Most of the test subjects were Betas, but a few were Omegas—ones who'd slipped through the registry cracks." He tapped the next stack, a sheaf of paper with dense, handwritten notes. "Financials. All of the embezzled funds from Uchiha Corporation. Obito's signature is on every transfer."
Sasuke stared at the lines of numbers, at the neat red pen slashes in the margin, at his father's name in block print at the top of the sheets. His vision doubled for a moment. He forced himself to look away, to focus on Itachi.
There was more. A series of scanned medical records, with his mother's name in the upper right corner. Sasuke slid the sheet closer, eyes tracking the words "unexplained seizure" and "toxicology: arsenic, acute." He read it twice before the meaning sank in.
He looked up at his brother, the question half-formed in his mouth.
"Orochimaru poisoned them," Itachi said, voice flat. "I think he did it with Obito's approval, but I haven't found that link yet. When the poison took effect, he set the house fire to destroy any forensic evidence."
Sasuke inhaled, but the air didn't reach his lungs. He pinched the bridge of his nose, fighting the urge to crumple all the papers and throw them in Itachi's face. "You kept this for years and never—"
Itachi's voice dropped to barely more than a whisper. "Every time I tried to reach you, Obito was there first. He had people watching your every move. The only reason I'm sitting here now is because you contacted me before he could stop it. As far as he's concerned, I should remain a ghost in your life."
Sasuke's knuckles went white around his mug. A decade of rage coiled in his chest with nowhere to go, the truth stealing even his right to hatred. His jaw ached from clenching, but what argument could he make? His brother had sacrificed everything while he'd lived in comfortable ignorance.
Itachi's gaze shifted, the hardness in his eyes giving way to something more vulnerable before he leaned forward. "What changed, Sasuke? After all these years of silence, you called me twice in the span of a month. Why now?"
Why now? The question hung between them like a blade. Sasuke's throat constricted. Tell Itachi about the lab? About Orochimaru? His fingers twitched toward his pocket, then away. About Naruto? God, no. The mere thought sent ice through his veins. But if not Itachi, then who? Ten years of hatred crumbled under the weight of new truth, leaving him unmoored. He needed allies. He needed his brother. But Naruto? He couldn't risk that. Sasuke's jaw clenched until pain shot through his temple. The rest. Just the rest for now.
Sasuke reached into his pocket and withdrew a small black USB drive, placing it on the table between them. "I found something," he said quietly. Itachi's fingers closed around it, his expression tightening as he examined the label.
Itachi turned it over in his hand, eyes narrowing at the label. "What's on it?"
Sasuke summarized in crisp, controlled syllables. "A recording. Obito and Orochimaru, discussing the fire, the set-up, and that I'd be watched. You were right about everything."
Itachi nodded, then set the drive back on the table. Sasuke watched his brother's face transform—the subtle shift in his eyes, the slight tightening around his mouth. Gone was the man seeking reconciliation; in his place sat the tactician, analyzing variables and calculating risks. It was a look Sasuke hadn't seen since childhood, when Itachi would spot inconsistencies in their father's business associates' stories. "Where did you find this?" Itachi asked, voice measured.
Sasuke's fist clenched against his thigh. He'd already crossed the line; he might as well see if Itachi had answers. "I've been looking into Orochimaru myself," he said, watching his brother's face for any reaction. "There's a laboratory beneath the university." Something flickered in Itachi's eyes—recognition, perhaps fear. "When I found it, everything had been removed except a single USB drive. It had my name written on it."
Itachi leaned back, his fingers steepled beneath his chin. "A single drive with your name on it. Nothing else." It wasn't a question but an assessment, his dark eyes calculating as they narrowed to slits.
Itachi's voice was measured, calculating. "Just the audio recording that implicates Orochimaru and Obito? Nothing else?" Sasuke's pulse hammered against his throat. Hearing it stated so plainly made the trap seem obvious now. He stared at the small black drive between them, the damning evidence that had consumed his attention so completely he'd never questioned why it had been left for him to find.
Sasuke leaned forward, his voice cracking. "I need to know what's going through your head right now."
Itachi studied Sasuke's face with narrowed eyes, the silence between them stretching taut before he finally spoke. "Did Orochimaru know you were investigating him?" Sasuke's knuckles whitened as he remembered Orochimaru's office—the man's smile, the mocking tone.
"Yes."
Itachi's fingers drummed against the wood, his eyes never leaving Sasuke's face. "Orochimaru wanted you to find it. Obito would never be so careless." Sasuke's jaw tightened in agreement—he'd already reached the same conclusion. Itachi leaned forward. "We need to understand his motive."
Sasuke's throat constricted as he forced out the question. "What are you thinking?" The words hung between them as he braced himself, both desperate for Itachi's insight and terrified of what it might reveal.
Itachi's shoulders dropped slightly as he exhaled. "I'm speculating here. Orochimaru operates on logic only he understands. But if I had to guess..." He leaned forward, voice dropping.
Itachi's words hit like a physical blow. "He knew you would seek me out after you heard the audio." Sasuke's jaw tightened. The manipulation was so obvious now—he'd played directly into Orochimaru's hands, contacting his brother less than twenty-four hours after finding the recording.
"Why would he need me to reach out to you?" Sasuke asked.
Itachi leaned back in his chair, his eyes narrowing in thought. Sasuke's pulse hammered in his throat as he waited, each second stretching into eternity. When Itachi finally spoke, his voice was low and measured. "This meeting might not be about me at all. What if he simply needed you off campus?" The realization hit Sasuke like ice water. His mouth dried to cotton as understanding dawned—this wasn't just misdirection but strategic isolation. The phone felt suddenly heavy in his hand as horror crystallized: Orochimaru had orchestrated this entire scenario to ensure he was here, miles away, while Naruto waited unprotected in their room.
Sasuke's hands trembled as he yanked his phone from his pocket, nearly dropping it as he fumbled to call the only person who mattered. His chest constricted with each unanswered ring.
The automated voice cut through him like a blade: "The number you are trying to reach is currently unavailable." Sasuke shot to his feet, coffee sloshing forgotten across the table as his trembling fingers stabbed at the redial button. The same mechanical response echoed in his ear, each repetition hammering another nail into his chest.
"Sasuke?" Itachi called standing up as well, "What is going on?"
Sasuke didn't answer. He bolted from the café, his body operating on pure instinct, every cell screaming one command: get to Naruto. The need to see him, touch him, confirm his safety with his own eyes overrode all rational thought. Nothing else mattered.
Three blocks from the café, Itachi caught up to Sasuke's side, his footfalls silent against the pavement. His fingers closed around Sasuke's bicep with surprising strength, halting his brother's desperate stride. "I'm with you," he murmured, close enough that only Sasuke could hear. "But I need to know what we're running toward."
Sasuke shook him off, face gone two shades paler than usual. "Naruto." His thumb mashed at the call button again, but the line to Naruto kept dumping him straight to voicemail. Each time, the hollow beep at the end sounded more final.
His own words echoed back at him like a taunt. Stay put. Answer your phone. The instructions he'd meant as protection now twisted in his gut—had he just handed Naruto to them, gift-wrapped and waiting?
Itachi kept pace, moving parallel as they headed for the university. "Who is Naruto?"
Sasuke's earlier caution crumbled like ash. He whirled toward Itachi, his voice cracking on syllables he'd never allowed anyone to hear. "If anything happens to him—" His fingers dug into his brother's sleeve, knuckles white. "Itachi, I can't—" The words strangled in his throat as his composure fractured completely.