Chapter 10

The two 'girls' went in the little restaurant for dinner since there was no room service available. They both ordered some sushi and Naruto ordered some sake. He had tried it before since he looked older now, but most of the time they asked to see an id. But surprisingly - or not - the waiter didn't ask and immediately brought the girls some sake.

When he walked away, Naruto whispered, "Wow, I should really be a girl more often."

Sasuke rolled his eyes and poured a little bit of the strong alcohol in their two little cups.

They ate and drank pretty much in silence, but at some point they started getting a little bit tipsy. They both weren't use to drinking and even if it was just a little bottle, it still had some effect.

Naruto just started telling Sasuke about everyone in the village, and at the beginning the raven was rolling his eyes like he didn't care, but after a few more gulps of sake, he was smiling and even laughing at Naruto's ramblings.

"…And Kiba, oh my God Kiba is so retarded! See he likes Hinata, and to seduce her he sent his dog to tell her. How retarded is that? Sometimes he thinks his dog is a human. And Shino! He's always like, Naruto, when you came back from your training with Jiraiya, you didn't even recognize me. That was freakin' two years ago! Can't he get over it already? And oh my God Shikamaru's the worst one. It's so obvious that he loves Temari, but he just won't admit it and he says it's too troublesome! He's so annoying! Why doesn't he just go out with her already?"

Sasuke interrupted him, laughing. "Yeah well it's just like Suigetsu and Karin, I mean they pretend they hate each other, but… they're not fooling anyone."

"Yeah...!"

"Hey pretty girls, sorry to interrupt," a guy from a table nearby stood and came to talk to them. "It's just we saw that you seemed to be drinking and having a good time and my friends and I, well we were wondering if you ladies wanted to... join us!"

Naruto and Sasuke looked at said friends the guy had mentioned and they all looked like perverts.

"No thanks we were just leaving." Naruto said.

"What about you then cutie?" the guy asked Sasuke.

Naruto suddenly felt possessive. He stood and took Sasuke by the arm.

"I said we were leaving!"

"She can talk for herself!" the guy said, smiling at Sasuke.

Sasuke stayed silent, but his glare was pretty scary.

"Come on please! Why not?" he pleaded again, apparently turned on by the glare more than anything, and he raised his hand to brush Sasuke's pale cheek.

"Because she's with me!" Naruto said pushing the other's arm away.

"What? Two sexy girls like you, I can't believe it, it would be such a waste!" he protested. When he didn't get an answer he went on, "prove it then!"

Naruto looked at Sasuke, who raised a delicate brow. Naruto took it as a challenge. It was quite a sight for the perverted drunk men looking. Naruto softly brushed the long raven hair of the other behind his shoulder and moved closer. Their lips touched and they kissed softly. Sasuke surprised Naruto by licking his bottom lip, and Naruto put his arm around the other's waist to pull him closer and deepen the kiss. He slid his tongue in Sasuke's mouth, and they battled playfully to dominate the kiss. Naruto pressed their lips together one last time, and then they finally pulled away.

Naruto just looked into beautiful onyx eyes for a moment, and he suddenly remembered where he was. He glanced at the other guys. They all had their mouth wide open and were staring, some of them literally drooling.

Naruto laughed and took Sasuke by the hand. "Come on, Karin!"

Sasuke just nodded and followed him back to their room.

Naruto closed the door and leaned on it, changing back into his normal appearance. "Aww man did you see their faces? It was so hilarious."

Sasuke also changed back. "Such perverts..."

"Yeah I know! But we made them shut up that's for sure!" the blond laughed.

Naruto chose not to talk about how intense the kiss had been for him, but somehow he was certain it had been just as intense for Sasuke.

It was getting really late and - the alcohol probably not helping - they were both really tired. They lied down each in their respective single beds, and fell asleep quickly.

xxx

Sasuke was eight years old again, training with his brother happily. Itachi was teaching him how to throw kunais with more skill and precise aim. After the training, they were both laughing while going back home happily. Mikoto and Fugaku were smiling when they stepped inside, proud of their boys.

The scene changed again…

"No matter what happens, I'll always be your brother, and I'll always protect you..." Itachi was telling him while they were sitting outside on the porch.

Another change of scenes. Sasuke was walking inside his big and abnormally quiet house. But suddenly he gasped and fell on the floor.

Not that again, please not again...

His parents, their dead bodies lying on the floor. So much blood...

"Nii-san?" Sasuke cried out, looking for his older brother.

"Otouto..." Itachi whispered in a broken voice behind him.

A now sixteen years old Sasuke turned around and Itachi was standing in front of him. He was bleeding and weakened but his hand was still reaching towards Sasuke.

"Otouto... I just need... your eyes," Itachi stuttered.

Sasuke was frozen, he just couldn't move. He felt so much pain as his eyes were ripped off of their sockets. As he was screaming, he tried to cover his injuries with his hands but he couldn't, someone or something was stopping him, was holding his arms back.

"Sasuke! Sasuke stop!" someone was yelling.

Was it... Naruto's voice?

"Naruto..." he whispered.

His eyes snapped open, panting and still struggling a little.

Naruto was sitting next to him in the bed, holding his arms tightly. "Are you okay? If I let go of your arms are you gonna stop rubbing your eyes like you want to rip them off or something?"

Sasuke was breathing hard. "Yeah..."

Naruto let go of his arms slowly. He lifted his hand towards Sasuke's face, just to wipe away the few tears that were still lingering on the raven's cheeks.

Sasuke looked away; he didn't like to be seen like this. But at the same time, he really felt like crying right now. The memories of Itachi would just never go away, and it was always getting worse. He was probably becoming mad or something...

"Sasuke..." Naruto sighed, sitting beside him in the bed, "It's not your fault."

Sasuke looked up at Naruto's blue eyes. "What?" he whispered.

"It's not your fault, okay? You didn't know."

"What are you talking about?" Sasuke asked, trying to stop his voice from trembling.

"Itachi... You talked in your sleep, Sasuke. You blame yourself for so much; you put so much weight on your shoulders. But you were so young, you couldn't have possibly known..."

Sasuke shook his head. "I killed him, Naruto." He whispered. He was really trembling now. He didn't know why, but it needed to come out now. "I killed my brother, and all this time, he was just saving my fucking life." He tried to swallow the tears, but it was just too hard.

He barely noticed Naruto had wrapped his arms around him and was holding him tight. He buried his face in Naruto's chest and cried, his body racked with sobs.

"You didn't know..." Naruto told him again, rubbing circles on his back soothingly.

"I didn't want to know! I was blinded by... revenge and... And now I lost him. He was my only family, and I loved him so much. And now he's gone, and it's my fault. And I... I can't have him back."

"It's not your fault," Naruto protested once again.

The blond was caressing Sasuke's raven locks with one hand and holding him with the other, rubbing his back soothingly to try to ease the trembling a little. He had never seen Sasuke like this before, but somehow he knew this had to happen.

After Sasuke had calmed down, they fell asleep like this, their bodies entangled together. Sasuke clinging to Naruto, just to hold on to something...

In the morning Sasuke woke up with a new determination. Naruto was still sleeping soundly. Good, he thought. He softly moved away from Naruto's arms, and he got up. He fixed his clothes and placed his sword on his back. Before leaving, he wrote a little note for Naruto.

Sasuke didn't even bother changing into a girl's appearance. He just left, and no one noticed him anyway. He took the road, not even bothering to hide. He didn't care anymore, he felt completely alone, and that was okay. Or maybe he was only trying to convince himself. What had happened with Naruto, this closeness, the kiss, these... feelings between them? It couldn't happen again.

As Sasuke had expected, not long after he had taken the road, a group of ninja from the Land of Lightning came across him. They were five and their leader told them to stop when he saw the man that was standing in front of them. He looked carefully then gasped.

"Uchiha Sasuke! I can't believe it! What the hell do you think you're doing, wandering around here?"

"Yeah!" another one exclaimed. "We've been searching you for so long! Raikage will be giving us great rewards if we can bring you to him! Alive or dead, that is!"

Sasuke smirked as they kept rambling on the rewards and stuff like that. He took his katana in his hands. It felt good; maybe he really was going mad. But he just needed to fight, that's what he was good at doing. He wouldn't hurt them. Well, not too much anyway. He didn't want to kill anymore people uselessly. Maybe Naruto was starting to rub off on him...

One of the ninja was sent away to bring reinforcements. So there were four standing in front of the raven.

"So are you gonna shut up and attack me or what?" he smirked.

When Naruto woke up, alone, he was very upset. He put his head in his hands and sighed 'I can't believe he did this to me...again'. He had read Sasuke's note and he didn't know what to think anymore.

Naruto,

Go back to Konoha. Tell them I attacked the Sound ninja on my own. You'll be just fine. And you shouldn't give up your dream of becoming the Hokage, you're almost there. As for me, I can't be close to anyone. Don't chase after me anymore. You have your own life to live.

He was really pissed. Sasuke didn't understand anything. After giving Naruto this one chance to get closer to him, he just fucking left like that? His own life to live, he thought bitterly, was this a fucking joke? Sasuke really didn't understand him at all.

He left the place quickly, determined to go, yet again, after the raven and do something, anything that would make him understand. Maybe punch him, or just shake him and yell to stop fucking running away all the time...

Sasuke was actually enjoying himself. His sharingan could see through all the movements and attacks of the opponents; it was like in slow motion. He didn't use any techniques; he just fought back with his katana and tai jutsu. And he didn't really hurt the ninjas, he just knocked them off or hurt them enough that they wouldn't stand up for a little while.

He was getting tired, though, because more and more were coming. It was as if the Land of Lightning was deploying an army to fight him or something. Well, this was probably the Raikage's influence… But the raven didn't care, he just kept fighting; he was in a sort of trance. Fighting made him forget everything, and he felt thrilled. He just wanted to stop thinking. At this point, he didn't really care if he was outnumbered and getting more and more exhausted; he wasn't scared of dying...