useddreameater | [XI fic; .01.] Steps

Title: Steps
Characters: Baby!Sasuke and mini-Itachi
Rating: G for Great Amounts of Fluff. And also for G.
Summary: Itachi helps Sasuke take his first steps, and they are adorable forever.

It started that summer, around Sasuke's first birthday. Sasuke had learned how to crawl, and could scoot around the house at almost frightening speeds, so he needed to be closely monitored. Itachi was often assigned to watch him while his parents were at work or otherwise busy around the house.

Sasuke was starting to pull himself up by chair legs and bedskirts and, consequently, fell down a lot. Itachi was careful not to let him out of his sight, but even a vigilant seven-year-old boy can't keep constant track of an antsy one-year-old. Once in a while, he'd hear a tiny thump, and then he'd rush around until he found Sasuke, about to break into tears, and hug him, tickling him and soothing his mind with gentle brushes of you'll be okay, and feeling little image-bursts of scared/fell/hurt/brother/better peek back across.

Pretty soon, Itachi hardly had to come running when Sasuke fell down, because by the time he found him, Sasuke was already busy pulling himself back up, responding with okay/brother/came whenever Itachi asked.

One night, when their parents were home, Mikoto noticed Sasuke pulling himself up by the windowsill, and called the rest of the family over.

"I think he's going to try to walk," she said excitedly when they asked, "Fugaku, honey, go get the camera," hustling her husband off to help preserve the moment.

Fugaku left the room, and Mikoto began cooing to Sasuke, trying to coax him away from the window, to get him to venture the few steps towards her.

Sasuke looked over at Mikoto, and then at Itachi. Itach felt a -tug-, the mental equivalent of Sasuke pulling on his sleeve, and then Sasuke asking brother/mother/what in his confusion. Itachi sent him a reassuring mental picture of him walking over to their mother's arms. Walk to mother, he encouraged.

Sasuke, thus emboldened, took a shaky step away from the windowsill, an act which caused Mikoto to gasp slightly and beckon more urgently. Sasuke took another step and wobbled a little, staring at Itachi over their mother's shoulder. Scared, he thought frantically at his brother, scared/fall--

Itachi projected reassurance, wrapping Sasuke in the mental equivalent of a hug. Won't fall, he "said." Mikoto was only six or so steps away. Promise.

And to the shock of Itachi, Mikoto, and Fugaku, who had just returned with the camera, Sasuke shifted slightly and began to toddle, waveringly but somewhat steadily, towards Itachi, who was a full twenty paces away. Ignoring the fact that now both his parents were watching the two of them, Itachi told Sasuke, no, mother, go to mother--

Brother, Sasuke insisted, taking another couple steps. And, to Itachi's surprise, a much clearer thought, more closely defined, followed: Won't fall.

And so, Sasuke tottered over to Itachi, half-stumbling, half-running the last several steps and burying his face in Itachi's knees as Itachi bent down and picked him up, smiling wider than he ever did.

~

His parents wiped the tape after it showed Itachi's eyes glowing a soft red that was just a little hard to attribute to the camera alone, but Itachi kept the memory for himself, even in the After days, when he kept so much of himself locked behind masks and bars. It rose up sometimes, in strange places; during winters, on trains, in underground bases.

Sometimes, when he would allow himself to examine it, to let the mask slip down, his thoughts would drift towards the future, towards their inevitable meeting...

Sasuke.

Don't fall.