We have fallen down again tonight

In this world it's hard to get it right

Trying to make your heart fit like a glove

What it needs is love, love, love

He had himself and in the end that's all he really needed wasn't it? He couldn't hurt himself, he couldn't hate himself because he was himself. He could love himself and care for himself, he was always there to console himself. In the end that's all that really mattered wasn't it?

Then why was he here? Why was he an Akatsuki when all he needed, all that mattered, was himself?

Love. Why else would he be here? He couldn't fool himself, the feeling of someone else loving him was so different than merely loving himself. It was so good feeling and even though they didn't actually love him per say, they needed him, used him and for now it felt just as good as loving himself.

Everybody, everybody wants to love

Everybody, everybody wants to be loved

Oh, oh , oh, oh, oh, oh

Everybody, everybody wants to love

Everybody, everybody wants to be loved

Oh, oh , oh, oh, oh, oh

Hate was easy. It was easy to hate the world and everyone in it. To wallow in misery and hatred felt good but in the end it was as empty as everything else. But love was never empty, and as cliche as it sounds, love makes life worth living. When you hate you are by yourself, you force yourself to be alone, but when you love then there is more than yourself, since you love you can't be alone.

It was even better when someone else loved you too. Each human was their own entity, their own soul, their own person. It made him giddy to think about it. When two people loved each other, it was two people coming together to create something new. Something perfect.

He had never known that kind of love, but he loved himself. He never had to hurt because no one could rip apart what didn't exist. Just as the thought of two people coming together made him giddy the thought of that bond being destroyed terrified him. When someone that loved you pulled away what happened? Was it like dying? He didn't want to know; but he did. It fascinated him that people could love each other.

He loved himself more for feeling that way.

Happy is the heart that still feels pain

Darkness drains and light will come again

Swing open up your chest and let it in

Just let the love, love, love begin

Everybody, everybody wants to love

Everybody, everybody wants to be loved

Oh, oh , oh, oh, oh, oh

Everybody, everybody wants to love

Everybody, everybody wants to be loved

Oh, oh , oh, oh, oh, oh

He understood why Nagato thought about pain the way he did. When you felt something, anything, it made you more real. Since he could feel, since he knew he was feeling, it meant that he was real, that his love was real. Living was difficult but it was also good to know that he lived, that he was something, that even though no one else loved him, he loved himself.

That's why he didn't care what he looked like, didn't care that he was a missing nin with a price in blood on his head. He was alive and he knew how to love and he loved himself. Who were others to judge anyway? They didn't love him like he loved him.

Oh, everybody knows the love

Everybody holds the love

Everybody folds for love

Everybody feels the love

Everybody steals the love

Everybody heals with love

Oh, oh, oh, just let the love, love, love begin

Everybody, everybody wants to love

Everybody, everybody wants to be loved

Oh, oh , oh, oh, oh, oh

Everybody, everybody wants to love

Everybody, everybody wants to be loved

Oh, oh , oh, oh, oh, oh

(chorus and bridge repeated until end of song)

This was his lullaby, his reason. He didn't need anything else but this connection, it was his definition. He was the nightmare that existed on the fringe of reality and he could accept that, he wasn't deluded into thinking what he did was 'right' or 'wrong', what did it matter anyway. He represented the love of the earth, that's how he thought of it anyway. Everyone dies at some point and they returned to the earth. It was love, and so he incorporated himself into that cycle. He only did what was natural, love was the pattern of the universe. And he would make sure he was part of that cycle, for as long as he lived until he returned himself.

This was his lullaby.

This is 'Everybody' by Ingrid Michaelson and oddly it's really pretty upbeat, just our delusions right? :D