There is a reason anger was cast down to dwell within the realm of sin. Not just to live, but to rise up and become one of the seven greats that had the ability to rule the hearts of men. With snakelike ease, it could glide inside a man, easing through the cracks of a broken soul. And there it would live curled up beneath one's heart, growing to the point where it could constrict all reason, all honest desire to live.

Curse me. Hate me.

And it is only in hindsight – maybe mere seconds, sometimes decades after – that one realizes the true foolishness of a life ruled by wrath.

Sasuke exhaled heavily, the taste of blood and sweat and rain tainting his senses. Deep down, hidden away in some remote harbor of his childhood self, the part of him that remembered how it had all been – how it should have ended - was mourning. Never would that small vestige of innocence stop questioning why. Just as it still mulled over his brother's actions. Ungoverned by hate but consumed by a never ending grief, it would plague him with questions over his actions today.

Only minutes before, the answer had seemed all too clear. Avenge them. An ever present hatred would see to that. His life, from that breaking point on, had been spent living under that one belief. All the fame garnered, all the hours spent training, no longer to gain his father's attentions, but to force blood-stained repentance from his brother. There was no other way. Never really had been since the day he had rallied the pieces of his mind and heart around the sole purpose of vengeance.

And now, as he knelt there, he realized the truth of it all: he had become exactly what his brother had urged him to be. All those years spent hating him, loathing him, and yet, he was falling right into Itachi's hands. No wonder his brother could have cared less about him at their last meeting. Ever so perfectly played by the very man he wanted to kill. Slowly, Sasuke felt himself numbing from the inside out.

However, his path lay before him, the final marker of his known self laying right there by his knees. His fingers ached to reach out, to touch that face, to brush soiled fingertips over those closed eyes. He was so impossibly close to the boy. So close… splinters of his dark hair dripping unspoken regret over the surfaces of the boy's cheeks. Yet another parting memory he wished he could erase from his mind.

But it was those memories – those little volatile memories ripe with sorrow and remorse – that carried him through, urging him on to complete his task. Never would that angry serpent allow his heart to rest until he ended it all, hands stained further. Oh, but it would be justice then. Hard and swift and satisfying vengeance. This is how Sasuke consoled himself. Because in the end, every hard-lined, heartbreaking step would pay off in the end. In his brother's blood he would settle his sins.

When anger works to heal those fissures in a splintered soul, it cannot simply be discarded without everything coming undone. He understood this now, and perhaps, had always known it. Sasuke stood, fingertips sending a small shower of pink-hued raindrops to the dirt as he went. He could stay here no longer.