Dammit.

I'll never understand the need people feel to intervene.

If anyone needs me, I'll be training.

Deidara.

Where do you get off sending me something like that.

What makes you think I would ask you for anything?

((A note for anyone in the vicinity of room 406 or room 609: Sasuke has just very loudly slammed the door to his room on the sixth floor, and promptly made his way down to Deidara's room on the fourth. Another rather loud slam can be heard on the fourth floor, followed, possibly, by screaming of various sorts. Just so you know, it won't be a quiet confrontation.))

It was not a jutsu, Sakura.

There is overbearing proof that they are gone from this island. Be it back to where they came from or somewhere else, it's somewhere we are incapable of going right now.

Stop being blind, deaf, stubborn and stupid.

((Might I add that I'm guessing Cheri managed to drag Sasuke back to the apartments at some point in the past day or so, considering I haven't been able to get in contact with Cheri-mun at all, and I figure hypothermia is a bad thing.))

He's... gone...

He was there, and then the second I blinked he was just gone.

Like he was never here...

I'm leaving. I can't say where I'm going, but it's somewhere not here with all of these people acting like hardly anything's changed.

[Filter:Private(Moderately hackable due to a bit of inner turmoil CHERI I AM LOOKING AT YOU)]
There was a clench in my chest when he wasn't there all of a sudden. I thought he'd just left and that I'd dozed off, since I haven't been sleeping well, but when I realized he was really gone...

Why does it feel like there's a hole in my chest? Why does it feel like there's something missing now that he's not here? I didn't need him, I don't now, I don't care, I-

Why does it hurt so damn much?
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((Oh, Sakura-mun! If she wants to find him, at least until tomorrow night he'll be at the clearing where they had their training session. Drop me a line if you want to, I'll be around.))

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That idiot.

Why did I even care if he went out there and got himself killed? I don't even know what possessed me to pass by the healer's tent. I don't have anything to do with the tournament anymore. I haven't even been watching it.

But he was there, from that mess. A complete mess. Why do I even care? I don't need him. The one training session I had with Itachi was more productive than any I had with him and yet...

I barely feel any connection to my own brother, but that moron... Why?
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Itachi, if you can find the time, I'd like to continue to train with you.

[Filter:Private]
That was harder than I thought it would be...

I heard his voice while I was in the tent, drifting in and out of consciousness. I didn't think he would come to see me... He's such an idiot.

I saw Itachi on my way out. He seemed to still be unconscious. Seeing him lying there, pale from bloodloss just didn't feel right. He looked almost fragile and weak, and it felt all wrong.
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I managed to beat him.

It was close, I had the feeling it would be close.

I didn't stay to see if the clerics got to him in time...

These wounds have bled through the cloth I tied around them, I think I might be losing too much blood.

((Say hello to the dumbass who was too stubborn to go see the clerics after his match and is likely about to pass out from bloodloss.))

So, I'm fighting him, then.

Still, it doesn't change anything. I'm still not going to hold back, and I don't expect him to, either. If Halloween was anything to go by, he wouldn't, anyway.

[Filter:Private]
I doubt I'll be facing Naruto. I'm not sure why I feel disappointed about it; it wouldn't have been a very engaging fight. Maybe I just wanted the chance to prove that I don't need him or his friendship.

I... had said to him I would kill him, after all, to prove just that...

And I don't. I don't need him. I don't want to be around him, I don't want any of it. Maybe...
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[Private:Viewable by Itachi/Possibly hackable by Cheri]
Sharingan. That's what this is. It's activated by chakra just like any other jutsu, but not just anyone can use it...

Only the Uchiha clan. It's called a kekkei genkai, a bloodline limit passed down through the generations. It can copy any technique it sees, be it ninjutsu (I've remembered several jutsu that fall in this category since arriving here), taijutsu, or genjutsu, and, as I've seen firsthand, it's capable of accurately predicting an opponents next move (which should be useful in this tournament).

While it's easily spurred to activate by anger, I can activate it now as easily as blinking or breathing. Itachi can use it as well, I remember, but his was... different somehow.

I remember, someone came to the house when I was young (seven...eight? Everyone was still alive, but I can't remember...), accusing him of a crime, something to do with a suicide they suspected to be murder...

They must have been relatives of ours, because they also had the Sharingan, yet they accused him, and he attacked them for it, until someone... no, our father came along to stop him.

Except it wasn't our father that stopped him, it was me, something I said, and he got on the ground before our father and bowed to him. But I remember, clearly, when it was over and he looked toward me, the Sharingan in his eyes changed...

The name of it is on the edge of my mind but I still can't grasp it.
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I don't know how far I'll get in the tournament, but I won't lose to anyone weak.