10

"Y-yes," he sat up straighter. It was his turn now.

"According to Uchiha Sasuke, you two have been teammates for seven years: three years officially and four unofficially. Is this correct?"

"Um, yeah, I guess so," he glanced at Sasuke. He didn't look back. Naruto gulped quietly and took a deep breath, trying to calm his clamoring nerves. "Yes, seven years."

"You were assigned to one of the two teams that left Konoha four months ago, intended to locate both Uchiha Itachi and Sasuke, yes?"

"Yeah," he nodded. "I was with Sakura, Sai, and Yamato-sensei. The second team was Hyuuga Hinata, Aburame Shino, Inuzuka Kiba, and Kakashi-sensei."

"How did you manage to track down Uchiha Sasuke?" At this, Sasuke actually turned to look at him. How did they find me?

"Ah, Kakashi-sensei summoned his K-9 unit and we split up into even smaller groups to spread out and try and catch his scent. While Sakura narrowed it down to one of Sasuke's new team members—the girl, Karin, I think—myself, Hinata, and Yamato-sensei ran into Yakushi Kabuto." Sasuke was genuinely shocked. Kabuto? "He had been there when Sasuke and Orochimaru had their final fight, and he got hit with some of the backlash, giving him some of Orochimaru's leftover powers. He said he owed me—the Leaf—something for what he had done, so he gave us a book that had lots of useful information on the Akatsuki, like their ranks and a generalized location of their hideout. We followed it and Sasuke to a place near the Nerutral Grounds, where we confronted Itachi as well as a few Akatsuki members."

"The Neutral Grounds, as in the wastelands located in the center of the Four Countries?"

"Yes."

"And you fought Akatsuki there?"

"Well, there were only three members there besides Itachi—a shark-guy named Kisame, a weird-looking guy with a Venus Flytrap for a head—" Sasuke rolled his eyes. "—and this other guy that was supposedly their leader."

"Can you give me a brief summary of what happened?" Tsunande raised an eyebrow, emphasizing the word brief.

"Um… The three-man team Sasuke had made were all taken out by Venus-Flytrap-Head and the leader after they helped Sasuke defeat Itachi—"

"So, Itachi is dead?"

"Yeah," Naruto nodded. "I didn't see the fight for myself, but we had to face off with Venus-Flytrap-Head and Kisame, and I got stuck fighting that crazy leader of theirs."

"Casualties?"

"Sasuke's team all died," Naruto looked over at him apologetically. "Itachi, Kisame, Venus-Flytrap-Head, and Leader Person."

"Deidara and Tobi as well," Sasuke added.

"Thanks to Hinata and Sakura, the Leaf didn't have any casualties," Naruto concluded.

Tsunande looked down at her papers for what seemed like a long time. Finally, she lifted her head, her eyebrows drawn together and her face frowning. "After Itachi and Akatsuki's defeat, how did you get home?"

"Well, Yamato-sensei went to the Akatsuki headquarters with Hinata, Shino, and Kiba to seal up all those jinkurichi spirits they'd collected so far. Kakashi-sensei, Sakura, Sasuke, Sai, and myself came back here. I carried him," he gestured to Sasuke, "and Kakashi-sensei carried Sakura. Sai managed on his own."

"You are aware that Yamato-san and the rest of his team have arrived back in town safely?"

"Yeah, I heard," Naruto grinned. "That's good."

"I have one more question, Naruto, and then I'll need to ask you both to step outside and allow us to hold a conference over Sasuke's verdict."

"Shoot," he tried to smile.

"…When Sasuke decided to leave Konoha in pursuit of power, he became a renegade, as I'm sure you know," she said with a trace of sympathy. "When you went after him, it was perceived that his return was forced, but Sasuke has stated that he came back willingly. Did you ask him if he wanted to come back to Konoha, or did you merely assume and carry him back here?"

Naruto blanched. He looked at Sasuke and Sasuke looked at him. Then he glanced back at Tsunande to make sure he was hearing things right. "Why did I bring him back, is that what you're asking?"

"Did you bring him back, or did he come willingly?" she pressed.

"He came because he wanted to, of course," Naruto looked offended, actually. "If I had gone up to Sasuke after that battle and he had said 'get out of my face', do you think we'd be here right now? I mean, of course he told me to leave him alone, but that's just how Sasuke is; he wants everyone to leave him alone. Sasuke will tell anyone who will listen that he has two plans for his life: to kill his brother and to restore his clan. Seeing as his brother's dead, where else is he going to go? Just sit out there in the wastelands and rot?"

"So, did you convince him to come back?" Tsunande accented.

"Yes, I did!" Naruto was getting angry. "There was no use for him to be away from here anymore, and when I pointed that out to him, he agreed and became willing to return here!"

"So, he did return of his own free will?"

"That's what I've been saying!" his patience was quickly fraying at the seams. "If he was just going to be a stubborn bastard and stay out there to rot, I still would have dragged him here, but he's the one who said 'let's go home', so we did." At his phrasing, Sasuke blinked. Did I really say that? He couldn't remember; it was all hazy and pain-filled.

"And so you carried him here because he wanted to be come back here?"

"Yes!" his exasperation leaked out of him with that, and he slumped back in his chair, exhausted.

"Mm," she nodded her head, closing the file in front of her. "Alright. You two may step outside now. I'll call you back in when we reach a decision."

Sasuke stood but Naruto sat there, giving her a weak but intense glare as if sizing her up. Was she really trying to help after all? Sasuke nudged his ankle with one foot and he rose heavily to his feet, and they both left the office—Sasuke doing his gliding thing and Naruto clomping along behind, very un-ninja like. The sixteen Anbu were still there, still standing at attention, and Naruto had the vaguely-amusing idea to poke one of them on the shoulder and see if they toppled over like dominoes. He did no poking, though, he merely plopped himself down on the waiting couch outside the office (which was much more comfortable than those damn wooden chairs they'd been sitting in before) and kicked out his legs, stretched his arms back and hooked his forearms behind the couch back, letting out a repressed sigh of mixed relief and fear. Sasuke merely sat down next to him, quiet. For a while, neither of them spoke.

"What's that Old Hag's problem?" Naruto mused aloud, closing his eyes and dropping his head back.

"…that went a lot smoother than it could have been," Sasuke shrugged.

"Yeah, right. It's like you were up for—er, nevermind."

"Murder?" Sasuke smirked.

"So what?" Naruto wrinkled his nose. "It's not like that anyway." A pause. "Hey, Sasuke? I'm sorry about talking about your team and your brother like that. You know, like…"

"Like they were dead? Naruto, they are," Sasuke gave him a weird look.

"I know, but, when the Old Hag asked me to be brief I just sounded like a heartless asshole, just rattling off all those deaths, you know?"

"She wanted the facts and you gave them to her. What more do you want?"

"I'm just saying. I don't know if those people became your comrades or not—"

"Nothing fancy like that," Sasuke sighed. "Just tools that wanted to be used, so I used them."

Naruto didn't have the energy to get offended. "They just followed you, right? You didn't force them or anything?"

"You know that's not really my style, Naruto," it was Sasuke's turn to not become offended. "I asked, they said yes, I told them what we were up against, and they still decided to come. It wasn't my fault they died." As an afterthought, he mumbled, "I knew Akatsuki was strong, but I didn't think they were that strong."

"What was that?"

"Nothing, just thinking to myself."

"Oh," Naruto wanted to press but didn't. "Think it went okay in there?" he gestured at the double doors.

"It just went," Sasuke shrugged once more. "It's not as if we needed to make an impression on them, it just needed to be done."

"Right." Another silence. "I hope it went okay, though."

Sasuke tried not to show his grin. Whether it went "okay" or not was for Tsunande and the council members to decide (because Sasuke had placed their robes when Naruto didn't), and whatever the outcome, he was pretty sure he'd be okay.

The worst was over, after all.