Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto

A/N: Hello. I'm going to do a little bit of a rewrite here. You could describe this sudden rewrite as falling off the inspiration tree and hitting every branch on the way down. No real changes to the plot, just a tad more depth, a pinch more angst, more focus on Naruto and perhaps more perversion from Jiraiya…okay, a lot more perversion from Jiraiya and boat loads more gratuitous violence from the beloved Tsunade-hime.

00 Prolouge:
Naruto lay on the ground, staring blankly at the sky as the rain poured down around him and onto the unconscious form of his teammate.

The weather was so fitting. Dark and windy and stormy; it seemed as though the spirits had seen the pointless battle between the two and cried for the lives that would forever be haunted by the greed for power. Perhaps such was fate…

Everything hurt so badly. His body felt like it was on fire from the inside out and, who knows, perhaps it was. The blonde boy had never channeled so much of the Kyuubi's chakra in his life. Not to save himself from abusive villagers, not to fight back the village shinobi who wished to do him harm for nothing more than existing, hell, not even when he thought that Haku killed…

The blonde cringed at the thought of his teammate and moved his head, hissing in pain as his body screamed in violent protest, towards the Uchiha.

Sasuke was lying on his side, next to the blonde. A cursory glance revealed that while he was out cold, he didn't appear too worse for the wear, apart from an acute case of chakra exhaustion.

Naruto could feel the demon within him stir, 'You should worry more about your own wellbeing than that of a traitor kit. You are at the end of your tolerance at the moment and need to get to the old woman so she can heal you. I can only do so much and that hole to the chest took a lot out of the both of us.'

'I know…but I still need to bring him back…I promised.'

The fox sighed inwardly. He couldn't find it within him to begrudge the wishes of his kit, 'Fine. I'll channel a bit more chakra into your body and that should enable you to take us all home, but remember that after that you need to rest for at least a week! Your body took one hell of a beating there and I need time to recover so that I can finish healing you.'

'Alright…and thanks.'

Naruto grit his teeth in agony as he felt more chakra flare through his abused coils and rolled on his side to get up. The blonde grasped at the earth his hands rested on, not noticing as his once human nails were now slightly longer and claw like. He flattened his palms against the ground and pushed himself up slowly, wobbling slightly to the side as he felt his legs want to give way.

"Need…to get…home…"

The blonde unsteadily made his way to his unconscious friend…or was it enemy? Naruto didn't waste any energy in thinking about it, pushing it to the darkest recesses of his mind as struggled to pick the Uchiha up.

"You…bastard…don't you ever…do…this shit…again….'cause I'm too…tired…"

As he attempted to hoist the other nin over his shoulder, he noticed that the cursed seal on the Uchiha's neck began to glow red.

Kyuubi, seeing this, cursed and barked to his vessel, 'Oi, kit! I'm going to give you more of my chakra. You need to burn the seal off his skin before he awakens!!'

Naruto gasped as he felt a torrent of chakra course through his arm, 'Kyuubi!! It's too much chakra!!!'

'I'm sorry kit, but you need to use it to burn the seal off before it wakes him up! We can't fight him off if he wakes up now with the snake's power!'

Naruto bit back a scream at the chakra burning through his body again. He placed Sasuke on the ground and placed his hand over Orochimaru's seal, letting the demonic chakra burn the seal away.

'Will this really work? Just burning it away…is it really that simple?'

Naruto felt Kyuubi nod, 'It should, although normally I would not advise it. My chakra is rather…potent and I'd rather not waste it on an ungrateful whelp like this.'

'Kyuu…'

'You know my feelings concerning this mortal before us. He is far too weak mentally to handle power and the snake was aware of this. Had he been mentally stronger, he would have been able to fight it like he did in the forest or during the preliminaries instead of giving in when things got difficult. Had he been stronger the snake would not have been so tempting.'

'What do you mean?'

'Curses like this play on a person's weaknesses. On this one, the curse was fueled by feelings of rage, jealousy and hatred. Think of it as a drug of sorts. The more he wants power, the more that he genuinely craves it, the more it will give and tempt him with.'

'Wouldn't that mean that Orochimaru was manipulating him them?'

The fox snorted, 'No kit. It merely gave life to what was already festering beneath the surface. All this one wants is power and unless he decides to change, there is nothing that we can do about it.'

Naruto felt the chakra in his arm die down and looked to the Uchiha's neck to see a burn mark replacing the seal.

'It's gone?'

'Yes. Now get moving, you need to get to a hospital.'

'Hai.'

Tsunade had gone to the hospital initially to help the shinobi injured during the invasion recover and in part to soothe her own frazzled nerves on the mission she sent Naruto, Shikamaru and the others on. She chewed on her bottom lip distractedly as she flipped through some patient files that had been given to her when she entered the hospital.

'They should all be fine. We've wiped out the more experienced Oto-nin in the area and the Uchiha is just one person against a whole squad (1) and even if he begins to channel the cursed seal; Neji can block out the Uchiha's chakra and Naruto could utilize some of the Kyuubi's chakra without compromising his own seal' Tsunade thought as she began fighting a growing sensation of dread.

'Naruto will be fine. He's the only person who's survived the curse, there's no way he'll die easily (2).'

It was at about this time that the remnants of the retrieval squad began to filter in. A large number of medic-nin surrounded the first of the arrivals, obscuring Tsunade's vision of who was being treated.

Tsunade rushed to see who it was and had to stifle a gasp at the sight of Hyuuga Neji. The boy simply looked awful. There were scratches and cuts all over his body; and then of course the hole in his chest which permitted the Hokage to clearly see through the boy and to the stretcher he was laying on. Taking a deep breath, Tsunade rushed towards the boy and began to perform diagnostic jutsus in unison with the residing medics.

After a few tense seconds, "Take him to the regeneration chamber."

The medic-nins surrounding the young Hyuuga went into action and rushed the boy to the chamber.

Tsunade looked around the hall, "Shizune?"

The dark haired woman rushed towards her, "Tsunade-sama?"

"Right now there are about four medic-nins going to the regeneration chamber, gather four more and lead the Chikatsu Saisei no Jutsu."

Shizune's dark eyes widened in shock, "Who is the patient?"

"Hyuuga Neji, he has a hole in the upper left portion of his chest. His aorta was nicked but was healed before he could bleed out; right now you need to seal the hole to prevent infection and further damage."

"Hai." And with that Shizune rushed to her duties.

Tsunade sighed and took a moment to wish for Naruto's safety. When finished she motioned to the hidden ANBU to approach, "Usagi, Neko, Suzaku, what is the current situation with the Uchiha?"

The rabbit masked ANBU spoke up first, "It appears that Orochimaru planned for the Uchiha departure and left behind a squad to deal with pursuers."

"How was it that they were able to take the Uchiha?"

A bird masked ANBU answered, "All signs point towards Uchiha Sasuke leaving with them willingly. There were no signs of struggle in any of the areas he has been known to frequent. Furthermore, from Tora's report, it appears that he has taken with him numerous aide kits, technique scrolls and weapons."

The blonde Hokage's eyes narrowed, "So the cursed seal was not interfering with his mind?"

"No Tsunade-sama, it doesn't appear to have adversely affected his thinking. Our current theory is that his cursed seal is apparently somewhat different from Anko's, although we can only speculate as to how without examining it further."

"So the last Uchiha is a traitor."

The cat masked ANBU nodded, "At the moment it appears that way. There is also concern that the sound nins aiding him are likely to be cursed seal recipients."

"Damn," Tsunade thought on it for a moment, "Alert Jiraiya about this development," Neko bowed and left, "You two are to gather Kage and Hebi. Tell them to seek out and destroy the Oto nins helping the Uchiha. Also, Hound should be coming back from a mission soon, inform him of his student's actions."

"Hai."

A/N: all of the jutsu information has been taken from wikipedia.

Chikatsu Saisei no Jutsu Literally: Healing Resuscitation Regeneration Technique: This jutsu uses a part of the patient's body as a medium to heal their wounds (in Neji's case they used his hair.) It requires an almost room-wide seal and a lot of time to complete. The medic-nin on hand actually have to trade places after tiring, indicating just how long it takes.

1. Preliminary reports on his disappearance were uncertain as to whether Sasuke had anyone waiting for him on his way to Orochimaru.

2. Tsunade's necklace. Remember it's rather unappealing habit of cursing it's wearers to an early grave? coughcoughNawakiandDancoughcough