It took them two days to reach their destination. Two days. Two days of bickering with each other, driving Yamato crazy, watching Sai get punched in the face by an enraged Sakura, peace making between each other, and trying not to reveal themselves. Two days.

"Okay, everyone… We understand the plan, correct?" Yamato asked the three of them quietly as they hid in the brush. His jaw tightened with anticipation when they all nodded. He raised his hand and waved forward. All four of them darted toward the underground building stealthily.

They all looked around cautiously before entering the building. No traps. They were puzzled at the unarmed entry. Yamato shrugged a bit but went on, his senses on overload to pick up any small whisper, creak, sigh, or sound at all.

Blue eyes sparkled with hope, dark ones looked around blankly, and green ones were set with a defiant expression. Naruto reached for a kunai in his bag but when he pulled it out, the spool of thread fell out as well.

"Shoot," he muttered and pointed to it momentarily before quickly running after it, sending a shadow replacement in front of him first. Yamato and the others were too slow in stopping him, so they followed him instead.

Naruto cursed softly when he accidentally kicked the rolling spool as he bent down to pick it up. It went flying around a corner. The thread had not begun to unravel yet, but it was near to doing so. Occasionally, the boy would look up to see if anyone was in front of him, or if there were any traps, but seeing none, he continued the pursue.

"He's still such a reckless idiot," Sakura muttered under her breath. In reality, she was worried about him. What if he got hurt? He was running so quickly, too quickly, she thought, for them to keep up. How could a spool even roll that fast anyway?

Suddenly the spool rolled into a small circular room. The thread was snagged onto one of the sharp jutting rocks from the ground. "Itai…" Naruto murmured softly and watched silently as the spool continued it's crazy trip. Where was the momentum coming from?

He released his replacement and chased after the spool again, warily listening for any other person in the room. Finally, the spool stopped as it hit the wall, quite a bit of its length strewed on the barren floor. Suddenly a large rock skidded on the surface and jammed the spool into the wall, stretching the thread taut.

Naruto, at the same time the rock came flying by, pulled the spool out and fell backwards. The thread broke and he sat on the floor with the spool held tightly in his hand. What was that?

His eyes wandered up and he saw a familiar shadow looming over him. That's right, wasn't it? The first time they saw four months ago after a three year absence was in a similar circular room as well. Except this time, the top wasn't blown apart. There was a strange ledge where he was standing at.

"I've been waiting…"

Naruto skittered back at the cold voice. He looked down and discovered that, either by trick of light or bad eyesight, that the red thread had disappeared.

"Naruto-kun!" he glanced at the doorway where he had ran in from. Sakura, Sai, and Yamato stood there with hard expressions on their faces. The second time. They will bring him back.

"Oh, is this our goodbye party again? How nice…" the voice turned into a hissing laugh at the end. Orochimaru and Kabuto materialized next to Sasuke. "But I'm afraid we don't have any tea and sweets for our guests today… We mustn't show such rudeness, should we, Kabuto?"

Their sick joke continued. "No, Orochimaru-sama… Perhaps killing them will remove our shamefulness…" his glasses reflected light and gave them an ominous glow. His teeth glinted in the dim lighting.

"Go…" Yamato whispered quietly, but the room was silent enough for the whisper to be loud and irritating. Sai and Sakura sprung into action and Naruto picked himself up hurriedly, the spool still in his hands.

"Red thread, Naruto… I've been seeing that a lot lately…" Sasuke, again with his speed, appeared in front of Naruto, his katana already unsheathed and ready. "It irritates me so much…"

The blonde backed up from the cold voice that rang through the room. Mingling with his emotionless voice were the sounds of fighting. Shurikens fell and clattered to the floor, screams and grunts echoed past the walls, and already the sickeningly sweet smell of blood began to fill the room. It wasn't even fifteen minutes yet. This would be a bad battle.

"So… much…" he repeated with a strange glint in his eyes. He leapt at Naruto and swung the katana in front of him. Naruto was nearly cleaved in half when he brought up a kunai and blocked the attack.

He saw Sasuke's eyes flash with anger when he realized that their strength was nearly the same. His strength increased a bit as they backed off, staring at each other with strange gazes.

Sasuke had a sadistic look in his eyes but his face was blank. Naruto's face was twisted in something between regret and anger. They charged at each other again, ignoring the other two fights around them. Yamato against Orochimaru. Sai and Sakura against Kabuto.

The entire world swirled around them as they fought, no mercy. Nothing. Their visions locked onto each other as red eyes clashed with blue ones. Each punch was blocked, each slash was avoided, no blood was shed in this battle. Yet.

By instinct, halfway through the battle, Naruto began unconsciously unraveling what was left of the thread with his left hand. Sasuke watched him as he began to unroll the thread. He tried to hit him but was unable to with Naruto's strange feline reflexes.

Naruto threw the spool up into the air, the rest of the thread loosely wrapped around his hand. Sasuke nonchalantly slashed it in half, but that small time interval was enough for Naruto to push Sasuke back and loop the thread around him.

Sasuke tripped over something. He glanced down to see a taut red thread pulled from the doorway to the wall. Naruto's aim wasn't perfect and Sasuke's left arm was still left unbound. In an attempt to break the fall, Sasuke stuck out his hand behind him.

His face twisted into momentary pain when he felt his wrist shatter from the impact with the floor. Thread be hanged! The ridiculous saying rang through his head as Naruto stood above him, grinning triumphantly, red thread pulled up with his left hand.

Somewhere from above, a free flying piece of rock flew down, and stupid and oblivious as Naruto was, he didn't avoid it in time and fell down on his face promptly. The thread was now intertwined between his fingers and around Sasuke's body.

Now, in this type of situation, a sensible person would take his katana and decapitate his opponent, but Sasuke, being very insensible right now because of the red thread that infuriated him so much, began wriggling out of the wrap. His katana, a few inches away from his hand, suddenly found itself hacking away at a seemingly flimsy thread.

Sasuke was even madder when he found that the stupid thread wouldn't cut. He slashed at it again and again, but it didn't work. Suddenly, it just disappeared all together. He growled loudly and looked around, but the thread wasn't there anymore.

"Sasuke-kun… What are you doing?" Sakura loomed over him ominously. Sasuke looked around the room to see that Yamato's clones were distracting both Orochimaru and Kabuto.

"Dang it… That piece of rock that I dislodged hit Naruto…" Sai flounced down and crouched next to the unconscious boy. He grimaced when he saw the free flowing blood gushing from the wound.

"You two! Take them and go! Follow the plan. If I don't appear in five minutes, take them to Destination B!" Yamato called out while trying to avoid a slash from Orochimaru.

Sai and Sakura nodded. The Uchiha eyed Sakura darkly when she stepped on his arm and took something out of her kunai pocket. Suddenly she stabbed a needle into his arm. Within a few seconds, he lost control over his body. He was paralyzed but he was still fully conscious.

His head lolled around when Sai picked him up and roughly slung him over his shoulder. He could see Sakura's shadow as she picked up Naruto and looked back nervously at their sensei.

Wind rushed past them as they began to run out of the room. A kunai embedded itself into the wall centimeters away from them as they went out.

"Sasuke-kuun, will come back, ssurely…" he heard Orochimaru hiss manically as metal clashed again.

---

"Tch… Idiot, wake up," Sakura poked Naruto's head after she was done dealing with his injuries.

"Nnrgh…" his eyes rolled when he struggled up. "We're in Part 2 already?" he slurred slightly.

Sakura nodded at him and walked over to the immobile Sasuke. She tsked at him and healed his wrist, but her expression did not hold the softness it once had. She glared at him and her voice had an uncomfortable edge when she spoke to him. "Don't try to move. You'll only waste chakra and you'll die if you struggle against the medicine too much. It'll wear away in three days…"

Sai stood above all of them, his eyes straining through the dimming light to see if Yamato was coming toward them. "We have forty-five seconds left," he said flatly, turning around to see his comrades and their captive. Naruto and Sakura nodded grimly and started to stand up.

"He's coming…" Sai informed them. Sasuke could faintly feel himself being lifted up by Naruto.

"Go… We have to hurry, we only have about three minutes to get out of here before they catch up. Destination C!" Yamato immediately commanded them. He was clutching his right shoulder tightly. It swung about freely but he didn't seem to care.

Sakura eyed his profusely bleeding wound, but she knew she couldn't heal him until they were at their destination. They darted in the trees and frantically began their escape.

After a while, all four of them stopped. Naruto practically threw Sasuke's limp body onto the ground and turned his head away so that he couldn't see anything. Cold eyes stared back into his own blank ones before Naruto walked away briskly.

He could hear some soft murmuring but nothing that he could decipher. The presence of another person told him that they weren't alone though. He assumed that "Destination C", whatever that meant, was here since the four of them no longer looked so panicky.

His head was turned back so that he was facing the sky after a while. Out of the corner of his eyes, he watched as the four of them prepared to sleep for the night. They were deadly silent though.

Soon the sky was dark, but a blazing fire kept the shadows away. Sasuke had a blanket draped over him now and was moved closer to the fire.

"I'll keep first watch," Sai offered to the other three. Everyone nodded tiredly. Sasuke watched them silently as they tucked themselves into sleeping bags. Sakura and Yamato were sleeping on opposite sides of the fire while Sasuke, Sai, and Naruto were all jammed on one side.

Sasuke was silent for two reasons. One, because he simply didn't want to talk and two, because he couldn't talk. The drug that Sakura oh-so-gently stabbed into him made him lose all muscle control except for his eyes.

It wasn't long before everyone fell asleep. Yamato and Sakura had lost a lot of blood during their battles. Sai had as well, but he was still forcing himself awake in order to protect them. Naruto… Well, he just sort of knocked out just because.

Sasuke was still awake hours after the others had fallen asleep. He was incredibly indignant that he was just caught by them in such a casual way. Where were Orochimaru and Kabuto? Weren't they supposed to be here already?

The trees rustled as a soft breeze passed through the area, making the fire crackle merrily. Sai suddenly shifted so that he was facing the fire, Sasuke, and Naruto. The Uchiha's eyes stared at the pale, emotionless face carefully. The light of the fire danced off his dark eyes as he gazed at Naruto. Suddenly his stare darted onto Sasuke's face. He didn't look away.

Sasuke could feel him scrutinizing every detail on his face. He didn't feel uncomfortable, being studied like that, but the feeling of wanting to kill Sai did come up a few times.

Sai's soft voice broke the silence. "Naruto… I think I understand why you are willing to sacrifice so much and go through so much for Sasuke…" Sasuke listened indifferently. Whatever he was talking about wasn't important.

Naruto shifted in his sleeping bag. "… Stupid… idiot…" he muttered in his sleep. "Sasuke… teme…" Sai smiled genuinely at the sleeping figure and stuck his hand out to ruffle up the blonde hair before turning away again.

Anger flared up in Sasuke's eyes. He hadn't been called that in such a long time, but instead of feeling happy he was furious. There wasn't anything he could do though, immobilized right now. So instead, he watched as Sai pulled out a long scroll and several pots of ink.

The scroll was unrolled but Sasuke couldn't see what was on it, since Sai was obscuring most of it. There was a small 'pop' when Sai gently uncorked one of the pots and dipped a clean brush into it. The tip came out red when he drew it out again.

Sasuke's eyes followed his arm as Sai brushed the ink onto the scroll. The movement reminded Sasuke of a red thread.

That's right… What ever happened to that stupid red thread anyway? Wasn't it wrapped on his body and around Naruto's hands? Then it just disappeared, didn't it? Sasuke wanted to tighten his jaw in annoyance, but couldn't. The myth resurfaced in his mind again and anger broiled within.

His breathing quickened as he became more infuriated. Sai made no sign that he could hear Sasuke's labored breathing. If he could have, Sasuke would have gritted his teeth but instead he just clenched his eyes shut and fell into fitful sleep. They wouldn't dare to do anything with him anyway.