Author's Note: Angsty drabble centering around one of my all time favorite characters, Itachi. Oddly enough, this idea came to me as I was browsing pictures. I came across one in which Itachi gazed toward the sky among the falling snow, and he looked so unbearably alone to me. It inspired me to write this, and I hope you enjoy it. If you are not up to date with the manga at least past Sasuke and Itachi's final fight, then you might not want to read any further because this won't make much sense. Anyway, I don't own Naruto or the characters, no matter how much I wish I did. Enjoy!

Falling Snow

By: Angel Wings-008

Itachi liked the snow, but not because of its beauty. If he was being honest, he couldn't say he thought it was beautiful at all. Not now. Such trivial matters had nothing to do with his reasons.

Motionless, listless, the eldest Uchiha brother stood on top of a hill with a frigid sort of grace, eyes unblinking and steady as he watched it fall in sheets upon the ground. Intrigue captured and held him close as it blanketed everything it touched in pure white, obscuring the vision of whoever ventured to look too closely. Such majesty, such secrecy...he understood it well.

Itachi didn't bother to draw his cloak more tightly around him, for he was never truly chilled by the raging elements. He merely watched without a single shiver or a twitch, even as the snow flakes fell in droves upon the land. Frozen for as long as the frigid breeze allowed them, free-falling from the sky in a slow descent to the ground, where they would rest until they melted and perished with the rise of the thawing sun.

We're kindred spirits, you and I.

Snow was cold and dead; so too, was he. He'd made sure of it on that fateful night, all those years ago. That was the only reason he was sane now, if this could be called sanity.

Snow obscured the truth; it blanketed the world in such a thick sheet, only the strongest could dig through the layers to find what the land below truly looked like. Itachi himself had done the same, shedding his face along with tears of blood and pulling on a cleaver mask. He had crafted the best deception; a sensible, albeit horrible, lie, that was easy for everyone to believe. With that, he had buried the truth and locked it all away along with his heart, effectively pulling the wool over eyes that would never know the difference.

"Itachi, we must move," said Kisame, coming up from behind him. At this, Itachi turned around to face him, wearing the same, emotionless face that now seemed permanently etched into his soul. His eyes remained unblinking; his stare, steady and sure. Forever unchanging...forever thirteen. He must remain unchallenged just like that. The weather was an eternal sub-zero, where the snow would never melt and the winter would never die.

But that was all right. Itachi could sacrifice emotion; he'd given up everything else. He would wear this facade and he would wear it well, until the fateful day that he would rest. Only then would he be able to let it slip if he chose, though even that was too much to hope for, if he could still hope at all.

A phantom image of a seven-year-old boy with shining, charcoal eyes danced within his head, and almost in a desperate way, he reached far out to take Itachi's hand. For a moment, he longed to lunge for that hand, to grasp it in his own and never let it go, to tell him that he loved him more than the entire world...but that was but a foolish dream; one that he couldn't forsake to this day. As per usual, the image lasted for a second and then it was gone...Itachi was blessedly numb again.

"Yes," he answered. He was use to the sound of his own voice now, dull and at times, almost monotonous. As caged and bound as his emotions and his heart. Itachi Uchiha was frozen and slowly drifting in a free-fall, the same as the snow surrounding him. Yes, they were very much alike.

Very much alike indeed.

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*sigh* I feel for him. I really do…poor Itachi. I hope I have his character right. I think I got him pretty well. I was really able to get into his mindset. Thanks so much for reading. Reviews are lovely, if you could leave one =).

10/10/2010: I edited this piece to include more description, and different wording in some areas. I'm more satisfied with it now ^_^.