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The Ripple Effect	By : Kay_Gryffin Category: Naruto AU/AR > General Views: 1502 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, nor do I own any of the characters or am affiliated with the studio that makes/produces the show or the manga and neither the studios or groups who make these songs, and I do not make money off of this fiction.

Chapter List
- 1-Remembering Him
- 2-Enough Is Enough
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- 2
This is the first and probably the only FanFic I'm posting here.

The Ripple Effect
"Lay your feelings bare,

Along with the huge love you feel:

The tears you cry will change your destiny.

Let your heartbeat echo through the dark.

We're sure to meet,

At the flag of that same pain."

Cold-hearted, is the devil's mistress Death.
She does not choose who deserves it the most, but chooses who She may. She does not care about whom She picks to take, does not know the challenges they managed to surpass and conquer. She just takes them, without care to the damage She does to the people closest to them. Death is the worst evil in this world, to all things that are alive, because She reminds them of the truth: all people are made to die one day, because that is the truth of life:
Nothing can stay.
Nothing is ever the same.
The ripples that we may cause in this world one day have to die. The ripples can affect all they want, but the key to them, with Death, is identifying the proverbial rock that caused them. If we can do that, then the people whom Death steals from us live forever—within memories and our dreams. Dreams and memories last forever—they transform, and they drift from person to person and imprint themselves in the Earth.
They are infinite.
Infinite.

The day of Itachi Uchiha's funeral was the saddest day that Fugaku had ever experienced in his life. He stood over the pale marble headstone, his onyx eyes downcast and empty, completely devoid of life. The rain fell onto the nape of his neck, pressing his overlong hair onto the back of his neck. He'd long since put down the umbrella he'd been holding for the whole of the burial, and he really couldn't find it in him to pick it back up. If he died of pneumonia, he wouldn't exactly be depressed about it.
He could remember clearly the day that Itachi was born. It was the first and last time that he saw a baby straight out of a woman—he decided that blue, alien-like, and screaming was not something he was overly fond of seeing, even if it were his child. When he saw him clean and fed, he decided that he liked his second-time opinion of his son rather than the first one, which earned him a smack outside the head from Mikoto, and another one from her best friend and his son's godmother, Kushina Uzumaki. Her fiancé, Minato Namikaze, decided it would be best to stay out of this one, and simply listened to Fugaku's whispered advice to not say yes to the doctor when asked to cut the umbilical cord.
The rest was almost dreamlike—Itachi began to grow up. He was an intelligent kid, more intelligent than most. He was always on the short side, and would rather read a book than start a conversation with children his age, but had no problem talking with younger kids. It became obvious as he got older and older that he just had a gift for being good with young children. He always knew exactly what to say, which made him Fugaku's helper when his second child, Sasuke, came around. Sasuke was nothing like Itachi had been—he was loud, attention-grabbing, and, when he got older, slightly obnoxious to people he didn't know. Luckily, Itachi was there to keep the younger Uchiha out of trouble, especially when Mikoto died in a car accident when Sasuke was eight.
Itachi had been only thirteen, and should've been out enjoying himself, but he decided to help his father with his younger brother instead, staying home and allowing Fugaku to relax as he entertained Sasuke, who had really taken his mother's death to heart. Sasuke had adored his mother—they were exceptionally close—and had refused to have human contact after she died. Itachi had forced him into making friends, into living a life, while his own social life took an extreme dip. He had been left with only a few friends—an annoying blond pyromaniac, an extremely morbid redheaded puppeteer, a silver-haired vulgar little God-freak, and his much older cousin with the mask fetish, who had too many faults for Fugaku to even want to think about.
All his time was spent with Sasuke, and so he only had friends left who were willing to help them with him. It was basically like Fugaku's home had become a halfway house for these wayward children; more often than not they were all passed out in his living room, bags of Cheetos and Doritos on the floor and couch, an episode of Yu-Gi-Oh! playing on the TV, Sasuke cuddled into either Itachi or Obito's laps.
Fugaku never minded this. He was glad to see that his son had friends.
This went on for a couple of years. He was more than happy to see Sasuke amass his own friends, thanks to Itachi's efforts: Minato and Kushina's only son, Naruto; Hiashi Hyūga's oldest daughter, Hinata; Shikaku Nara's only son, Shikamaru (and, by default, Chōza Akimichi's son, Chōji). They oftentimes came over to Fugaku's house, mingling with the older kids that were Itachi's closest friends. Fugaku had worried that there would be issues, but much to his surprise, they seemed to get on just fine, especially when they watched Shikamaru kick Hidan's ass at strategic board games and caused his cursing to increase ten-fold.
For a long time, they were living in peace. Sasuke was happy with his friends. Itachi was happy because Sasuke was happy. And Fugaku was happy because his sons were. He didn't want to think that any of their prosperity would end, and that seemed to be where he made his mistake—the Uchiha, it seemed, were always slated for despair.
When Itachi was eighteen, he was diagnosed with lung cancer. It had been the worst night of Fugaku's life. Itachi had been feeling chest aches and pains for months, and had developed a horrible cough only a month before his diagnosis. It was when he coughed up blood for the first time, while at dinner, that Fugaku decided that it wasn't just some bad cough. He took him to the hospital, and not even a full twenty-four hours later, Itachi was diagnosed.
Chemo had, obviously, been the first step for the Uchiha to take, his family right beside him as he suffered through the treatment. For a long time, Itachi was completely bald, which he was unashamed of—in fact, he even convinced Sasuke that it was a completely freeing experience, a fact the younger Uchiha refuted when he shaved his own head. Itachi put on a brave face, but they both knew that he was scared. So totally and completely scared. Nobody wants to know that they have something that's only purpose is to kill, especially at such a young age.
When Itachi was nineteen, they were told that the chemotherapy wasn't working. It had caused Sasuke to scream and shout at them, angry that they couldn't do anything to save his older brother. Itachi and his father had to physically remove the fourteen-year-old from the hospital, his lips set tight, and his body quivering with the force he had put in to stop himself from crying.
He was given only two years—estimated maximum—to live.
He held out for three and a half. Itachi was a fighter, but it was painful to watch him slowly succumb to the cancer, to watch him slowly crumble apart. Itachi had moved into the hospital for the last six months, and was visited every day by his family and his friends, who had all become his friends. A couple of times, all the Uchiha boys' friends—Sasuke's friends and Itachi's friends—fell asleep in his hospital suite, Sasuke curled up on his side beside his older brother, his hands clutching his tightly, as if that would stop him from dying.
Thankfully, it wasn't like that Itachi died, holding onto Sasuke's hand. But, unthankfully, Itachi had died in the company of Naruto, who was also dealing with the loss of his mother at the same time. Naruto had been in the hospital all day long, and he was checking in on Itachi. He had passed while speaking to him. What he said to Naruto, neither Fugaku nor Sasuke knew because he refused to talk about it with anyone, but whatever it was had the Uzumaki shaken. Not even Minato could get it out of his son, and Naruto did not know how to hide things from anyone…
"Dad."
Fugaku turned around, his eyes blank except for the briefest flash of recognition to see his seventeen-year-old son standing there, holding an umbrella over his head, free hand shoved into his pockets. Sasuke's original hair had returned years ago, though it was a near-blue black now instead of the simple black it was before. Though he wore a suit, his nails were painted dark purple, and Itachi's ring was on his finger. He fiddled with the piercing in his bottom lip with his tongue before he took a step closer, holding the umbrella over his head. "Dad, you're gonna give yourself a fever like that."
"Hn," responded Fugaku in standard Uchiha behavior, turning his attention away from his youngest son to the grave of his oldest. He couldn't look at Sasuke at that moment. Itachi had given him the piercing before he went into the hospital—the two of them had been drinking while Fugaku was out, and he came home to empty bottles of rum and two loopy, pierced and bleeding sons, one with a bleeding bottom lip and the other with two bleeding nipples. It wasn't the proudest moment Fugaku had of his sons together, but it was definitely one of the funniest, after he cleaned up all the blood off of his bathroom floor.
Sasuke took a step closer to his father, his onyx eyes betraying no emotion. "Uncle Minato invited us to go to dinner with him and Naruto later. I told him we'd be there. He's gonna pick us up at seven, and its three now. C'mon, Dad, we have to get you home, warmed up, and redressed. And probably give you some Airborne, just to make sure you won't catch anything from being a moron." Fugaku would've hit Sasuke outside the head if he really cared right now. "C'mon, Dad, let's go. Itachi'll be here when it stops raining."
His heart felt heavy. "Itachi's not here."
"Yeah, he is, Dad. Itachi will always be here. Now come on, Dad. It's cold and rainy, and I just want to be normal for a while. Let's go be normal for a while, Dad."
"I don't even know what normal is anymore."
Sasuke sighed. "Truthfully, I don't either. But we'll figure it out, Dad. We'll figure it out. Eventually, we'll figure it out."

Lyrics of the chapter is from "Re:Member" by FLOW from the album 'Anime Best'. (It's also Naruto opening #8).
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The Ripple Effect