Hello there! It's been a really long time since I've updated, I know, and I'm soooooo sorry about it, I don't really have an acceptable excuse and even if I did you wouldn't have cared anyways. But, it's out, so I hope you like it and please tell me if I made a mistake somewhere or something! I'd really appreciate some reviews too, if you don't mind :) _

Chapter 3: I Remember

In The Konoha Hospital:

There was something that kept tugging at the back of his mind as Sakura was talking to him, pulling him out of the present. He could see Sakura looking at him and he vaguely wondered if she had asked him a question but his mind was a bit foggy and he wasn't entirely sure what was going on. He was in the hospital, he knew that but what he couldn't remember was how he got there. Did he pass out again during training? Wait, no that couldn't be it, Sakura said he was close to dying, I mean sure he's been close to that before because of training but this time she made it seem like someone had attacked him or something. Then it hit him; attacked…he was attacked! Suddenly everything came rushing back to him, the force of it so intense he felt like he got the wind knocked out of him. It was hard to breathe and his mind shut out the white walls of the hospital, he couldn't see anything but the nightmare he was forced to endure.

He remembered coming back from a C-ranked mission where he had to escort a group of fisherman to their fishing village in the Tea country. A horribly boring and long mission in his opinion; he realized that they needed to be protected from thieves and the like but what he didn't understand was why he had to be the one to do it. Why was he doing this when he could be tracking down some Akatsuki scum? He remembered getting close to the Konoha, about a quarter mile out in fact, when he started getting suspicious. First of all he wasn't passing anyone who would be on their way in or out of the village; and Konoha was always busy seeing that it was the biggest village in the Fire Country and the village with the most ninjas. Second of all there weren't any animals nearby so that always means trouble. It also felt like he wasn't going anywhere when he knew he should be seeing the gates by now. Naruto stopped and listened for anything that would indicate that he was just outside of his village and heard nothing, not the presence of an animal nor the hustle and bustle of the village. That was when he knew he was already under a genjutsu. Putting his hands together he tried releasing his chakra to cancel it out. When he did so he noticed that someone was in the woods to his left so, still trapped in the genjutsu, Naruto turned and decided to directly find out who was responsible for this.

"I know you're in there, stop hiding like a weakling and face me!"

"Be careful what you say Naruto or else you might end up biting off more than you can chew"

Naruto ended up making a hissing sound as he sucked in air through his teeth, surprised at the voice that just emitted from the dark forest. He could never mistake that tone; Itachi Uchiha has come to Konoha. He instantly felt his body rise in temperature as his anger rose, hands balled in fists and his legs tensing into a fighting stance. He knew he was trapped in his genjutsu but he didn't care, all he wanted to do was beat the crap out of the man who ruined the life of his best friend and was part of the organization that almost killed Gaara. His eyes narrowed as Itachi stepped out from behind a tree and moved forward, facing Naruto about ten feet away. Naruto carefully put his hand on his shuriken pouch, ready to attack at any time.

Itachi noticed this and shook his head, "Naruto, don't be so foolish, surely you already know you're in my genjutsu, any attacks are futile."

Naruto tsked, moved his hand away and pointed his finger at Itachi, "What do you want! If you're after the Kyuubi, you aren't going to get him!"

Itachi sighed, "Rather than capturing you, I'm here to show you something."

Show me something? Naruto had about a second warning before he was hurled into darkness, completely at the mercy of Itachi's genjutsu.

He fell into the darkness until his feet met level ground, he couldn't see anything, not even the fingers in front of his own face. He closed his eyes and concentrated, he searched for any sign of life or the faintest hint of chakra, and after finding none he opened his eyes. As soon as his eyes opened, all of his senses came back to him. He gasped and his mind went blank, there in front of him, Konoha was burning to the ground, people were screaming, ninjas were fighting as huge snakes ravished the town. He seemed to glide into the village, seeing scene upon horrible scene.

A child struck by a kunai here, a woman screaming as she burned inside her own home there. Panic struck at his heart and he felt sick, the smell of burning flesh made him want to vomit. He tried to move his legs to run somewhere but his body refused to move, completely under the control of Itachi, so instead he just stood there silently, trapped in his horrible genjutsu. He glided past the academy and saw Ebisu, Konohamaru, Udon, and Moegi fighting a sound ninja. Another ninja came up from behind with a huge shuriken and aimed it at Konohamaru. Naruto tried to yell but nothing came out and he watched as Konohamaru was sliced in half, the rest of his team following suit.

Suddenly, tears fell un-controllably from his face as he watched the sound ninja jump off leaving their lifeless remains behind. This is just a genjutsu, he kept telling himself as Itachi moved his body further and further through the village. He then came upon Shizune, Asuma and Kurenai each fighting a member of the Akatsuki. This didn't make any sense, why would the Akatsuki and Orochimaru team up? Was destroying Konoha really that important to the both of them? These thoughts left his mind as he watched his friends die, one by one before him. By now he was shaking uncontrollably, forcing himself to remain calm, and reminding himself, once again, that it wasn't real. Almost as if he could read his mind, Itachi's voice sounded in the back of his head, "Watch and suffer, Naruto, as your friends fall before your eyes." He cursed him to hell watching as Hinata and the rest of Team 8 were wiped out by one of the Akatsuki members. Naruto was forced to watch as a plant-like ninja started to consume their bodies.

Naruto couldn't take it anymore, even though he knew it was only a genjutsu, everything was so real. He could physically feel his heart being torn as he watched the rest of his friends fall at the hands of the Akatsuki. By this time the only people he loved that were still alive were Kakashi, Tsunade, Iruka, Jiraiya and Sakura; and of course Sasuke, but he didn't know what role he was going to play in all of this. Though he knew it wouldn't be long now until he had to witness them too being killed in this hell of a jutsu. The fear he was anticipating, regarding the deaths of some of his closest companions made him lose it. His constant chants of 'this isn't real' were fading away and his mind was being taken over slowly, but surely by the madness.

Naruto struggled, his fox's chakra suppressed and his body useless. His clothes were heavy with sweat, his skin crawling and eyes slightly popping out of his head as he was dragged to another location. Surrounding the Hokage's mansion was a small army of what looked like sound ninjas, accompanied by the six Peins (or what looked like just a bunch of Akatsuki members to Naruto). Facing them, along with several Konoha ninjas, some familiar and some not, were Jiraiya, Tsunade, Kakashi and Iruka. Naruto knew now that he was going to have to face these people being brutally killed right in front of him. And so he did, one after another fell to the ground and he no longer knew what the emotions going through him were called. So detached from everything; Naruto didn't even notice his body being transported to the top of the mountain that the previous Hokage's faces were carved upon.

Suddenly Naruto knew what was going to happen, there were only two people left that had yet to be killed and those two were perhaps the most important of them all. Naruto started screaming in his head, yelling beyond furious and frightened at Itachi, pleading him to stop. Itachi only laughed and said, "Oh no Naruto, this next event is very important, I'm afraid I can't let you miss it."

Naruto gasped and shook violently; there on top of the Hokage Mountain were Sakura and Sasuke, fighting each other. Sasuke was, thankfully himself and not taken over by Orochimaru but was, if possible, more terrifying than anything Naruto had ever seen. He was grinning maliciously and his eyes were that of total hatred, his vengeance had consumed him and Naruto couldn't see his former best friend anywhere in that face of his. Sakura was on her knees by the edge of the cliff, staring up at him blankly, her face covered in blood, tears, and dirt. Sasuke, having charged his chidori, ran down the tree he was perched upon and came at Sakura laughing madly. Naruto yelled and yelled but Sasuke kept on going.

Even though he was far away, Naruto heard every word he said to Sakura, "It's a pity you wouldn't fight me seriously Sakura, don't tell me you still love me. Well if that's the case then you're even more desperate and useless than I thought."

Sakura's head hung low, tears dripping into her lap, Naruto was broken seeing her like that and tried to look away as Sasuke struck her directly in the chest, but Itachi made sure to hold his head up.

They stood there on the edge of the cliff, Sasuke with his hand in her heart and her eyes looking up at him. He leaned close and whispered to her but Naruto could still hear what he said, "You were right Sakura, all you were and are is dead weight; Naruto and I never needed you. You're such a pathetic excuse for a ninja." And with that he took his hand out of her body and let her fall backwards of the cliff and into the flames below. Naruto was silent as everything went back to normal and he was thrust back into the real world.

He collapsed on the spot and lay there motionless as Itachi stood over him. "Did you like that little show Naruto, well there's still more to come."

All that happened then was a series of blows to his body, he remembered his bones crunching and making noises then he remembered being cut on the side, blood pouring out of his wound, but he didn't care, he was happy if Itachi killed him. He was sure he would too, if he hadn't of disappeared so suddenly. Naruto remembered the face he made, it was shock; but of course he got rid of that soon and smirked, his lips moving but Naruto was too weak to hear the words that came out. His last vision was of Itachi looking down at him and disappearing. Then he could have sworn someone picked him up and set him down near the gate. After that he couldn't remember anything; he figured that was when he was in a coma.

Having basically experienced the whole thing over again, Naruto couldn't stand laying down in his hospital bed so he unhooked the iv's in his forearm and paced around, too worked up to concentrate on anything but still having the need to move.

Meanwhile, Sakura kept running towards Lady Tsunade's office, actually running into a few villagers on her way. They shouted at her but she didn't care, Naruto worried her and the sooner she got Tsunade at the hospital, the better.

"Lady Hokage!" shouted Sakura as she burst through the doors to Tsunade's office. Luckily, no one was in there except the Hokage herself. Tsunade stood up and urgently asked what was wrong.

"Naruto woke up, but he's acting really strange!"

"…" Tsunade just stared at her, eyebrow arched.

Sakura blushed and slapped a hand over her mouth as she realized how ridiculous she sounded. Tsunade raised her eyebrows and sat down with an exasperated sigh.

"Next time when you come bursting through the doors like that, make sure it's an emergency," Tsunade said, closing her eyes, "you almost gave me a heart attack." Sakura nodded and looked at the ground, nervously shuffling her feet. Tsunade rolled her eyes, "now what were you saying about Naruto?"

Sakura stood up straight and looked Tsunade in the eyes, "Naruto woke up and was acting normally, or as normal as Naruto can be; but then he just sat there quietly, I think he was probably remembering what happened to him but…my lady…his eyes, they frightened me; they were full of fear and sadness." She looked at Tsunade trying to convey just how important she thought this matter was. They both knew Naruto always had that trace of sadness in his eyes, he was the Nine-Tails after all; but this…this was abnormal.

Tsunade looked at her carefully and then shook her head, "Sakura, Naruto has obviously just experienced something dreadful, seeing that he was almost dead when you guys got here." Sakura flinched at her words; Naruto's bloody body was still so clear in her head. "Anyways, you can't expect him to jump around and smile like he usually is right when he wakes up from a coma."

Sakura nodded slowly and slouched. She knew it was foolish to get so worried about these little things, but she couldn't help it. After all, Naruto was almost dead when she found him lying at her doorstep in a puddle of his own blood. Sakura flinched again; she needed to stop thinking about that.

"However, I will come take a look at Naruto, we still need to figure out what happened," Tsunade said getting up from her desk and walking towards the door. Sakura looked out the window at the hospital and sighed, hopefully he can remember.

"Hey, are you coming or not?" Tsunade said holding the door open for her. Sakura blinked twice, turned around, and strode out the door muttering a 'thank you' as she passed. The entire way to the hospital was silent between the teacher and student, but inside their minds was the same question being asked, 'Naruto, what happened to you?'

Okay! That's the end of this chapter; again I'm really really sorry this is so late! But I guess it doesn't matter now anyways…the next chapter will be out much sooner, I promise. Until then, don't be afraid to review this story :) I'd gladly appreciate it. Thanks for reading! -Lauren