Warnings: YAOI! SaiNaru and SasuNaru. MPREG! There may be a death at the end, but I'm unsure. I love angst stories, but I'm a sucker for happy endings.

Summary: It was a sad ending, but at the same time it was beautiful. This is a tale of growing up, letting go, & moving on. They say you never forget your first love. And it's true, but you can move on, as long as there's someone there to help you out. SasuNaru SaiNaru

"No, you're wrong Sasuke. It was never easy…" Naruto said, and he walked away. He walked away from the forest, walked away from Sasuke, walked away from their battle, walked away from everything.

But most importantly…

He walked out of Sasuke's life for good.

After about 2 and a half years of training with Ero-sennin I finally returned to Konoha. Although training with Ero-sennin really helped me out, it was great to be home! And it was nice to see everyone again, especially Kakashi-sensei, Iruka-sensei, and Sakura-chan. Kakashi was still my goofy, always late sensei. Iruka-sensei was still like a father to me, and Sakura? Well, my crush on her eventually evaporated. I realized the only love I ever felt for her was platonic. Before I met her, I never really loved anyone, so I got the type of love mixed up. She was like a sister for me, and nothing more. The one I really loved was Sasuke. But I hadn't seen Sasuke in almost 3 years, so I didn't think he loved me back. No, I knew he didn't love me back. But that was something I'd have to learn to accept, no matter how painful it was. Sasuke had a dream. He wanted to kill Itachi and resurrect his clan. I could help him kill Itachi, but I couldn't help him resurrect his clan. I was male and I couldn't have children. I loved Sasuke so much, but I would never tell him, because it would only make him angry. So, when we rescue him, I'm going to help him fulfill his dreams. No matter how difficult it will be to see him with another, I can't meddle in his affairs.

Sometimes, when you love someone so much, you let them go if they need to be released. Being with Sasuke would only hold him down, and I cared for him too much to do that. I had to let him go. And that would be the hardest thing I would ever do in my entire life.

Sakura-chan reminded me so much of Tsunade-baachan. It was scary, so let me not mention that again. Sadly, I barely had time to catch up and see everyone again. Tsunade-baachan summoned me. Apparently Gaara was captured by Akatsuki, who were trying to extract Shukaku from him. So, she sent a group of us to Sunagakure in order to save him. The group consisted of me, Sakura-chan, and Kakashi-sensei. Later on, Lee, Neji, Gai, and TenTen joined us. Akatsuki had successfully extracted Shukaku, and because of that, Gaara had died. But, Chiyo, an old hag from Suna gave up her life for him, and he was brought back. Kakashi-sensei was injured pretty badly. He over-used the mangekyou sharingan. He wasn't going on and missions for a while.

Back in Konoha now, I wanted to talk to Tsunade-baachan about Sasuke. I wanted to go on another rescue mission for him. I missed him so much, and I didn't want to waste anymore time in letting Orochimaru take his body. But, in order to find Sasuke, we'd have to have a team. And we'd use team seven, but we were missing two people. We needed a jounin to replace Kakashi, and another person to temporarily replace Sasuke. I went running frantically around the village, searching for someone.

And that's when I saw Shino, Kiba, Hinata, Chouji, and Ino. Ino grew her hair out, Shino was still a freaky bug man, Kiba still had Akamaru, who was now big enough to ride on, Chouji was still fat, and Hinata was still strange.

And it was also where I first met him.

Sai.

I was talking with Chouji and Shikamaru, and we suddenly got attacked by some weird thing…It was an ink-like creature. Chouji counterattacked, and the thing turned into ink in his hands. He pointed over to a guy who was sitting up on a roof casually, with his hand over his mouth. He had a Konoha forehead protector on, so he was obviously a Konoha ninja. He had black choppy hair and matching eyes. Shikamaru mentioned something about capturing him, and he told me to attack him. The weird guy stood up, revealing that he wore a weird belly shirt sweater with a sleeve cut off. He also wore fingerless gloves.

When he saw that I was ready to attack, he grabbed a paintbrush, and created some more ink creatures. His eyes met mine, and I froze. I have no clue what it was though. It was strange. I must have been out of it for quite a while, because Shikamaru destroyed the ink-creatures.

"Who are you?" I yelled out. I had to know who this guy was!

And that's when the weird guy finally spoke to me. And I'll never forget what his first words were.

"You're fairly weak," He smiled, which I would learn soon enough that he wasn't too good at,

"So what do you have in between your legs? Do you even have a penis?" He asked me. Was he questioning my gender! How dare he! I'm a guy damn it! It's not hard to tell!

I was shocked at what he said to me. What normal person asked this? Well, then again, I guess this guy wasn't normal.

"I said, who are you?" I tried again, but he just kept on smiling.

"We'll meet again soon Naruto-kun." He said, winking and without being able to respond, he disappeared.

I was so mad at that guy! He humiliated me in front of Chouji and Shikamaru, not like they really cared though. Since Shikamaru and Chouji both had things to do, I had to give up the hunt for my new teammate for now. So instead, I decided to go visit Tsunade. And I was shocked to see that guy there!

Apparently, he was Sasuke's replacement, and some guy named Yamato was Kakashi-sensei's replacement.

"You know this guy Naruto?" Sakura asked when I kept glaring at Sai and pointing at him.

"Sorry about before Naruto-kun. I wanted to see how much I'd have to protect a dickless wonder." He said.

"EH! Take that back!" I yelled and was ready to jump him, but Sakura-chan held me back.

"Naruto! Calm down! He is our new teammate you know!" Sakura responded.

"Hmm, I like people like you, friendly crones." The Sasuke-wannabe said, this time, it was directed to Sakura-chan. She let go of my and was ready to attack him, but this time, I held her back.

"YOU WHAT?" She yelled out.

"Remember what you just said to Naruto? Calm down Sakura!" Yamato-taichou said.

Yamato-taichou explained the mission to us, and made us introduce ourselves. Turns out the bastards name was Sai. Yamato-taichou told us that we would be meeting back in one hour. We had to gather our things and weapons before leaving. I was a little happy, because this gave me a chance to talk to Sakura. I hadn't had a chance to do it much earlier.

"Damn it! I hate that guy! Why does he have to replace Sasuke? 3 people are enough…" I told Sakura.

"He is a bit vulgar, but isn't it a bit weird? He's a lot like Sasuke. Well, looks I mean. His hair and eyes are black, and he looks the same almost, even his voice is similar!" Sakura told me, and I got a bit defensive.

"No way! Sasuke's way cooler then that guy!" I said, and I think Sakura was a little shocked, because she starred at me for a moment before responding.

"Yes, I guess Sasuke is somewhat cooler."

"SOMEWHAT?" I yelled out. "No Sakura-chan, Sasuke is way cooler then Sai!"

I didn't like traveling with this Sai person at all. He had no emotions, and didn't even know the meaning of friendship. He kept talking down about Sasuke, and it pissed me off! Everything he said pissed me off! He didn't even know Sasuke personally. All he knew was about what he heard. And hearing things is nothing like knowing the actually truth.

I wanted to hit this guy so badly, and I tried a few times, but Sakura always stopped me, and she was the one who wound up hitting him. Pft, go figure.

Yamato-taichou was pretty weird too. Ok, no, weird isn't the word, he was scary. He made freaky faces when he saw that Sai and I didn't get along.

We stopped at an Onsen for a little while. Yamato-taichou treated it to us. I remember at one point Yamato-taichou had scared me, and I stood up, causing Sai to look in between my legs.

"Well, well! So you really do have one!" He said, and I blushed angrily, jumping back into the water.

Afterward Yamato-taichou built a house out of a jutsu, very impressive actually. And we stayed there for the night. Apparently someone who was with Orochimaru was some sort of spy for Akatsuki. So Yamato-taichou was going to pretend to be Sasori, and find out some information.

The next day, we trained for a little while, and this time, Sai really got on my nerves. He didn't know what a friend is, it seemed. And he asked me why I still cared for Sasuke, even after Sasuke tried to kill me. I told him it was because Sasuke was my best friend. I didn't add in the fact that I loved him more then anything, because Sai would be a bastard about it, and at this point, I couldn't stand it anymore.

I told him I'd do anything to get Sasuke back. Even if it meant that I had to work with him. As long as I'd get Sasuke back, it was worth it.

We made it to the bridge the next day, and Yamato-taichou used a henge to look like Sasori. It wasn't long before the guy who was working with Orochimaru came by. He pulled the cloak away from his face, and to our shock, it was Kabuto!

They began talking for a while. Kabuto mentioned that Orochimaru would kill him if he found out he was there, and after a few moments, when it seemed Yamato-taichou was going to attack, Orochimaru appeared.

I knew we'd have to eventually jump into action, because Orochimaru was smart, and he'd figure out that 'Sasori' was actually Yamato-taichou.

Suddenly, Kabuto jumped to Yamato-taichou and destroyed the cloak he was wearing. Snakes engulfed Yamato-taichou, but I was relieved to find out that he used a jutsu, and it wasn't really him at the moment.

I couldn't hear what they were saying, but Yamato-taichou snapped his fingers, and the three of us jumped out of our hiding spot.

"Ah, Naruto-kun! I'll be the one who tells you who has become stronger. You, or Sasuke-kun." Orochimaru said.

I clenched my fists at this. I could feel Kyuubi's chakra taking over my body.

"Give Sasuke back!" I yelled out and Kabuto smirked.

"Listen to me Naruto-kun, because I will only say this once. Sasuke-kun came to us on his own free will. You have to come to terms with that." Kabuto said. Sakura got mad at this, and yelled out to him.

"Kukuku, if you'd like to know Naruto-kun, why not try to force this out of me?" Orochimaru smirked, and I charged. The Kyuubi's chakra was slowly taking over, and I was getting more powerful.

I couldn't think straight anymore. I was pissed at the fact that Orochimaru seemed to claim Sasuke as 'His'. At those words, I lost control, and I didn't even think anymore. I had no clue what was going on.

And then, suddenly, I was laying down. Sakura-chan and Yamato-taichou surrounded me. I had no clue what had happened.

"Captain Yamato…where's Sai?" Sakura asked, and Yamato-taichou looked over to Orochimaru. We followed his gaze to see that Sai was talking with Orochimaru. And after a few moments, the three left together.