Edited ch1 Rueful Avenger. Enjoy.

Disclaimed.

He looked down at body at his feet with empty eyes and a numb heart. Despite his detachment, however, there was a painful lurch in his stomach and a dull burn in his esophagus as his body expressed feelings he had long ago abandoned. He had to concentrate to keep from swallowing or increasing his heart rate and giving himself away. He couldn't help but wonder at his body's ability to be sickened by the sight and smell of a dead body even after all the blood he'd shed. This was no ordinary corpse, however, which might explain his unusual response. No, not ordinary at all, this was the corpse that had once been Uzumaki Naruto.

He didn't jump when a cold hand clamped down on his left shoulder. "Do you regret it?" Madara asked.

"No." Sasuke answered simply.

"Liar." Madara accused.

"I am annoyed that you interfered in my fight." Sasuke looked away from Naruto's body and straight into Madara's eye.

"No need to look so murderous, Sasuke. Would you rather have died?" Madara taunted him, reminding him that without Madara's intervention, he would probably have already joined Naruto in the afterlife. During their fight Naruto had managed to hold his own. While he sustained serious injuries in the process, by the end of the fight he had overpowered and outlasted Sasuke. Heh, he never could match the dobe's stamina. In the end, Naruto had stood over an immobile Sasuke and smiled gently.

"I'll make it quick, then finish Madara and come join you. My dream is meaningless if my best friend isn't a part of it." His kunai had begun its downward descent and Sasuke had passed out from blood loss and chakra exhaustion before the final blow had even been struck. Talk about wimping out at the last moment.

When he came to he found himself at the tender mercy of Kabuto yet again, who looked freakier than ever. He took one look at the mad snake wannabe and couldn't resist asking, "You didn't alter my DNA or anything weird like that while I was out of it, right?" Kabuto then proceeded to reassure him in his new, slightly sibilant tone that Madara hadn't given his permission for experimentation...yet. Great. After finally getting away from Kabuto's covetous and slightly perverted gaze, Sasuke went to find Madara and ask him what had happened. Instead of finding the ancient man, however, he stumbled across something far more frightening. Naruto's empty body laying crumpled at the base of Gedo Mazo, which, not surprisingly, had one more open eye than the last time he'd seen it, making nine in total.

Sasuke ignored Madara's inquiry regarding his mental health. "What happened after I passed out?" he asked. Madara considered him a moment before answering, "He hesitated. After you passed out he hesitated and didn't finish you off right away. That's why I was able to capture him and retrieve you as well."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow, "So if he'd killed me you wouldn't have captured him?"

Madara laughed, a hollow, mirthless sound. "I would have caught him, but you would be dead." He stopped laughing and looked at Sasuke again.

Sasuke, however, had returned his eyes to the corpse of his former friend. "Hn. He fell into your trap, exactly as predicted. Too bad the fool didn't manage to keep his promise to take me with him in the end." A slightly bitter sneer graced his face momentarily. "The idiot always was mostly talk."

With that he turned around and walked away. He stopped briefly and turned to ask in an emotionless voice, "So, when do we destroy Konoha?"

Madara was pleased with the deadened look in his eyes and replied, "As soon as you're recovered." Without responding or taking another glance at the corpse on the floor, Sasuke calmly walked out of the room.

Lying on his bunk trying to sleep, Sasuke thought back to the last moments he'd seen Naruto, moments Naruto undoubtedly and foolishly believed to be the last moments he would see Sasuke alive. "I'll...come join you. My dream is meaningless if my best friend isn't a part of it." When he thought about it, that sentiment was the exact opposite of the Uchiha's; that the only true role a best friend could play in the fulfillment of a goal is through lending power by dying. Naruto, however, inverted that idea, instead asserting that if his best friend must be killed to achieve his dream, then he would die before it could be fulfilled. Ironically enough, Sasuke had still not actively participated in the Uchiha curse. He hadn't killed his friend to get the Mangekyou, and he had neither killed his brother to gain the Eternal Mangekyou nor taken Itachi's eyes from him while he was living. Itachi had been dying anyway and if he hadn't been there was no way Sasuke would have been able to kill him or take his eyes. Not that Sasuke was in any way innocent, but he was innocent of the crimes that were, in a way, his birthright.

What Sasuke couldn't understand though was the hesitation. Naruto was sure that he was doing the right thing for both of them; Sasuke could see it in his eyes. No hesitation. So why at the last moment..? Sasuke wasn't sure, didn't think he'd ever be sure exactly why, but he hardly thought that Naruto suddenly had a change of heart. Perhaps it was simply the sight of Sasuke unconscious that caused him to hesitate. Maybe it was Naruto's way of reminding Sasuke of his own hesitation in the Valley of the End. And that bonds can't be broken by anything but cold-blooded murder and sometimes even that's not enough. The dobe would have thought that way, trying to show Sasuke that even though he recognized the need to cut ties with Sasuke to accomplish his goals and protect his precious people he wouldn't do it. That he would, as always, seek to find another way. Or at least that he would wait to do what was necessary until they were on equal ground again, despite the fact that he'd already earned his victory once. Stubborn dobe.

Sasuke turned over and stared at the wall. He could already feel it. Emotion was flooding back into his tepid body. Not grief, but anger. He was angry at himself for giving in to weakness at such a critical time. Angry at Madara for robbing him once and for all of that final moment of understanding and of the closure that Sasuke would have gained by killing Naruto or being killed by him. Angry at Naruto for stubbornly maintaining the bond between them despite everything and dying before it could be fully broken by Sasuke. Angry at Itachi for lying to him and making Sasuke hate him for so long. And finally...regret. For everything. Sasuke could tell by now that he was going to betray Madara; he just wondered, in an offhand sort of a way, when Madara would realize it too.

R&R