Important Note: Um not the last chapter after all…my bad. Still another one to go. And sorry for the late update, the chapter was done a while ago however my beta has gone MIA and must be busy, poor girl. So I apologise for the lateness and the bad editing, but I figured it was better than you all having to wait even longer. I will attempt to get the next chapter out a lot quicker and will upload the properly edited chapters as they become available. I'm hoping to get the next chapter out very soon edited properly or not.
Dreams Aren't Real
Part 3
Chapter 3 (14)
Dreams About Holding on to Hope.
"Um…Sasuke?" Naruto asked quietly after a few moments of staring as the Uchiha opposite them stared back with a profound smirk.
"This has got be some trick," Sasuke muttered.
"No trick, why bother?" Was the reply. "I have you both exactly where I wanted you from the beginning. Think of our fight just now as a test of your resolve."
"Sasuke!" Naruto hissed a little more urgently now.
"Dobe, be quiet!"
"Sasuke goddamn it! Why the fuck does our enemy look exactly like you?"
It was true, standing across from them was an exact likeness of Sasuke right down to the arrogant smirk and the slightly bored eyes.
"I'm not really your enemy," Monster Sasuke pointed out.
"Shut up!" Sasuke snapped. "You aren't me. Don't you think I'd know if I was doing this? And why the hell would I trap and hurt myself in my own genjutsu?"
"Perhaps because you don't really like yourself very much. Besides, what's a little pain compared to the bond you two, or rather we, now share? I mean I knew deep down that I wanted to know that someone really did care about me as much as they seemed to, but not even me, your own subconscious, ever thought you two would end up fucking like rapid bunnies in spring."
"Wait, wait, wait," Naruto said imploringly, holding up his hands. "I feel like we skipped to the middle somewhere. Can someone explain to me how Sasuke is responsible for this without actually knowing he was?"
"Ah good, one of the easy ones. You might say that Itachi sort of had a hand in that."
"Itachi?" Sasuke asked with wide eyes.
"Well you've seen how Itachi can set up traps when he tried to take out Madera using you and Amaterasu. Think of this as a genjutsu trap using Naruto here and your own subconscious against you. Itachi set it up before you killed him. He knew you had gone off the path he'd wanted for you. He wanted to set you back on the right path but of course it wouldn't work unless there was some part of you that wanted it too. He also seemed to think that part of you might have a lot to do with Naruto here. He put his little trap in Naruto and the next time you two saw each other it activated, drawing you both into the trap together."
"I would have noticed," Sasuke persisted stubbornly.
"Your Sharingan was just about spent by that point. It was lucky at all that the trap was able to utilise what little chakra you did have left to spring into action. Itachi has used your own chakra for his traps before, it wasn't difficult for him to do it again. All you had to do to trigger it was for some small part of you to want to come back. Naruto got to you, you even acknowledged that yourself before in the cave. You wanted Naruto to love you like you thought deep inside that he might but would never let yourself believe was true. Your whole being wanted to reach out to him then to know if it was true and that was the spark that got everything started. The genjutsu trap activated and then it was up to your own subconscious to keep it on track. That small part of you that wanted to go home, to believe that Naruto really cared about you, the part of you that wanted to stop fighting was what drove the dreams. And that part of you is me."
"That's a little far-fetched isn't it?" Naruto asked unsure.
But all he had to do was to look at Sasuke to see that what Monster Sasuke was saying must have some truth to it.
Sasuke had told Naruto in the caves that there was a part of him that badly wanted to know whether Naruto really cared about him because it was driving him nuts not knowing and making him doubt his plans. And that small indecision, that little weakness in Sasuke was where Itachi's trap had buried itself, hiding itself even from it's own controller.
But still, "Tell me something only Sasuke and I would know."
Monster Sasuke rolled his eyes. "Alright fine. One morning on mission when we were about twelve you woke up cuddling me and drooling onto my shoulder. When I caught you I decked you and swore at you till you left the tent."
Naruto winced remembering that. He'd been sharing a tent with Sasuke. He had thought at the time that Sasuke was his pillow. It had been an innocent mistake at the time, but Sasuke had lost his nut at the intrusion into his personal space.
"Of course what you, Naruto, don't know and we do is that I was actually awake for about ten minutes beforehand. I didn't wake you up because I thought it felt nice. But once you woke up I got angry for thinking such things and took it out on you instead."
Naruto looked across at Sasuke to see him with a faint blush on his cheeks. Holy Crap! He didn't know Sasuke was capable of blushing!
"So this is all really true then. Sasuke was behind this the whole time?"
"An unknowing part of him, yes. And look at you both now. You have grown together, learnt to depend on one another without issue and you've shown you can work together too." The monster Sasuke's eyes flicked over to his counterpart. "This is the future Itachi wanted for us, and Itachi knew Naruto would be the one to be able to show you how to get here. All you needed was a little push. You need to place blame where blame is due and not on the lives of the innocents whose peace Itachi strove to preserve with his very life. At first he never wanted you to blame them, he wanted you to blame him. But before he died I think he just wanted you to not blame anyone and instead enjoy the peace he intended for you. Do you think you can do that now? For yourself?"
"How do you really know what Itachi wanted?" Sasuke asked sceptically. "You're only me and he didn't tell me the truth himself."
"You think the dreams were the only thing to trigger? His motives were imbedded in me. I know what he wanted for you."
"It's a bit elaborate isn't it? Why not just visit me in a dream himself?"
"That's easy: because you wouldn't have believed him. I doubt you would have come to this point without the hardship that went into it. Naruto is right about you; you do not believe what is real until it is proven to you with action. I maintain this was the best way to put you on track and assure that you have the right motivation to stay there this time."
"How could Itachi know that his little trigger would work anyhow? And I still don't believe I could have been doing this without knowing."
"So confused, so desperate to reach out, can you really be that surprised that you did reach out without knowing what you were doing?"
"Yes," Sasuke replied honestly.
"Well you know, Itachi knew better. If there was any hope of you reaching out, he made sure a small buried part of you would unknowingly exploit it."
Sasuke was staring at the ground by the other Sasuke's feet. He seemed to finally be starting to believe what he was being told. "So Itachi did do this?"
"Yes and no. Itachi just provided the means but you were the one that kept it going. And if you weren't so self involved and oh yeah, amazingly insane, you might have worked it out for yourself. Didn't you ever wonder why the dream manipulation came so easily to you? Didn't you wonder that even though Naruto had stopped dreaming for months why the dream never stopped? You say it didn't disappear because it knew Naruto would come back. Genjutsu's aren't thinking entities. The dream stayed alive because you believed Naruto would come back to you, just like he always does. You wanted this Sasuke, deep down you were reaching out for help from the only person you really felt could help you deep down," Monster Sasuke smirked at him, "The subconscious mind can be a funny thing, can't it? It knew, the me part of you knew, what you wanted more than you can even admit to yourself. And all it took was that one little moment of doubt from you when you and Naruto fought that last time to start this all up. Itachi might have planted the spark in the both of you, but it was your will that kept the dream on track. Every time something was proved to you that he cared enough to help you, the dream changed.
"The forest was designed to give you space, freedom to move but also provided the opportunity for the two of you to never come in contact if that's what you both desired in the end and it would have ended there if you had. But you talked without fighting and so the dream moved you somewhere different.
"Somewhere where you could still isolate yourself, the cove, but you were never very far away from one another. You had space to think for once, but Naruto was always in sight, your constant comfort. That is where you regained your friendship.
"The caves forced you two together in close quarters with each other. He was always with you and it made you talk to each other, to get things out in the open. I must admit, even your subconscious didn't foresee your regained attachment quite going to the level that it did, but it is what you wanted, even if you never really believed he felt so strongly about you.
"The fields gave you scope, it was designed to allow you freedom again, to make you feel like you weren't trapped in your life and you could anything you wanted. Unfortunately, this didn't work. You didn't follow the projected route this time. You became adamant that the dreams were better than real life because you had everything you wanted. You had half a life filled with comfort and caring and the other life where you were still seeking your revenge. And in the end it went wrong for three main reasons. The first one was because you had started to mess with the dreams, make it too much your own when it was never meant to be permanent. The second was because of your obstinate refusal to move ahead with your life and meet with Naruto in the real world. The third was simple; you were starting to lose him. He had started to suspect you didn't want to meet because you didn't care about him as much as he did you. If it had gone on for much longer he would have stopped dreaming by choice. I couldn't let that happen. But even your punishment had a design.
"The misty woods were a danger, it was to show you that the dreams were not where you belonged, not your personal getaway and I blocked your power too. I could not block Naruto's though, I didn't have the same access to his mind as yours. This is why what he creates here was able to hurt me. But it doesn't matter, I never really wanted to block Naruto. I wanted you to have to rely on him, I needed you to get that trust bond back. It was meant to force you to work together, to show you the team you would both make if only you would band together. And you finally did. Congratulations, by the way, it took you long enough."
"So what great message was the desert setting supposed to convey then?" Sasuke asked sarcastically.
Monster Sasuke shrugged. "Not everything has to mean something. I think it's beautiful. So did you, the first time you saw it. You've seen all these places before in one form or another though you obviously don't remember. I just plucked them from your mind and moulded them to suit my needs."
"Great, so you're telling me that I did this to myself? Why, to give me an 'out' of my current situation?"
"You always had an 'out', nobody ever forced you to continue on your chosen path but you. I suppose you might say it was reminding you of that. But it was also a lot about your need to see how great your bond could be with Naruto. Full points for that, by the way. I knew you wondered if your doubts stemmed from you just simply crushing on the one person who seemed to never give up on you. But who knew he was in love with you too? Well I suppose it does prove that some things are meant to be after all, doesn't it?"
But Sasuke hadn't quite gotten past the 'in love with' part. "Who said I was ever in love with him."
Completely forgotten Naruto winced. He might have gotten Sasuke to admit to loving him, but being 'in love' with someone was a bigger step entirely with what it implied. No wonder Sasuke had freaked out.
"Okay, so maybe you weren't at first. But I think you desperately wanted to be able to be. You wanted someone to understand you, you wanted someone to help you and deep down there was a small part of you that clung to the hope that Naruto really did understand you and care about you as much as he seemed to. You were confused by him and his determination, you wanted to know why and you also wanted to know why it made you second-guess your actions when he showed this to you. He loves you, it can't be so strange to think that you love him back. He is the lifeline that small remaining part of your sanity clung on to and now he will save you because you managed to hold on so hard."
"Save me?" Sasuke scoffed. "From what, myself?"
Monster Sasuke smirked at him. "I know you meant that to be sarcastic. But you are right and wrong. You no longer need saving from me, the nightmare monster. You are close to being on the track Itachi wanted for you and the one you longed for deep within yourself. The dreams are finished, they have run their course and there is no longer a need for them. What Naruto will save you from is indeed yourself. Though if none of this gives you that great epiphany you so sorely need to have, he still might end up failing."
By this point Naruto was thoroughly confused.
"Sasuke," Naruto asked the real one, "I don't get it. Did you do this or Itachi?"
"Haven't I explained this already?" Dream Sasuke asked in a slightly irritated tone. "Let me say this once more in simpler terms: Itachi created the connection when he came in contact with you both separately, but it was Sasuke's subconscious will that activated it. It was Itachi's hope that there was something left in Sasuke that truly wanted to be saved. And you with such a strong connection would probably be the most likely to draw that out of him."
"Well, why couldn't you just say that from the beginning!" Naruto exclaimed irritated. He still didn't totally understand what was happening but he did understand something important in all of this. "So if this dream was being controlled by Sasuke's subconscious or whatever, how come I almost died? Did he really want me dead?"
Dream Sasuke brushed it away like it was no big thing. "An unfortunate side effect. It wouldn't have occurred to him that you might suffer from the dreams, because he wasn't. But isn't it funny that the moment he figured out a way for it not to hurt you the dreams restarted again for you? You popped back in like you were never gone just in time for him to start training you. Convenient, no?"
Naruto ignored the barb. After all Sasuke wasn't trying to kill him. Just the opposite. He'd had such an unconscious desire to reach out to him, to be with him that this had all started in the first place.
"So the dreams are really over?"
"Yes. Tomorrow you will start a new day where real life decisions will need to be made. Naruto, you understand what you want, you understood a lot earlier than Sasuke did believe it or not. It didn't take much for you to re-establish that bond you once used to care about with Sasuke. But Sasuke, you, we, had more to learn. Unfortunately though I'm not sure if you paid enough attention to the lesson. You might have woken up to yourself where Naruto is concerned, but your priorities are still uncertain. Not even I know the full implications of what that might mean to your future if you chose to ignore what Itachi tried to teach you with all of this. But it is a decision you will have to come to on your own anyway if you are ever going to feel right about it. But know this, there are certain parts of your own subconscious that will hate you, make you hate yourself, if you fuck this up now."
It was so sudden. One moment Naruto was looking in between two Sasuke's staring at each other and the next he was waking up next to the real Sasuke who was just starting to stir. The last words dream Sasuke had said kept echoing in his mind though, over and over again.
He really did hope that Sasuke had gained some perspective because the alternative would be an absolute nightmare.
For once Sasuke didn't do his cat-stretch yawn routine upon waking. His eyes just opened and he stared at the ceiling for a few moments, a pensive look on his face.
Naruto rolled over to face him, content to just watch his face for a few moments while Sasuke thought this revelation through. But as the minutes dragged on and he still said and did nothing else, Naruto started to get nervous.
"Sasuke?"
"Are you going to tell me how pissed off at me you are now?" Sasuke asked tersely.
Naruto blinked in surprise. "What? No, what gave you that idea."
"My own mind almost killed you. All this happened because my resolve was fractured."
"Um, you say that like it's a bad thing. Well the almost dying was, but I think it was worth it. At least I hope it was. And that doesn't depend on what you unknowingly did, it will depend on what you knowingly do now. Do you really think I would be all pissed off because there was a small part of you that didn't want to keep doing bad things? Nah, Sasuke, that gives me hope."
Sasuke looked at him then and it took Naruto a few moments to register what he was seeing. The expression didn't look right on Sasuke somehow because it was an expression he'd never seen before. He looked so broken, so unsure and Naruto realised what he was seeing was naked vulnerability in Sasuke's features. It was heartbreaking to see. And on Sasuke's face, which always seemed to reflect cocky self-assurance, it was a little disturbing too.
"I don't know what to do," Sasuke whispered.
For Naruto the choice was easy, a no-brainer. But he had to appreciate that all Sasuke had been focussing on for all this time, with every fibre of his being was now being called into question. How could anyone so easily shrug off everything they strove for and believed in without it feeling like you were being torn in two? Naruto imagined it was just like when he had to choose between Sasuke and Konoha. It was a choice that had given him a lot of grief in the past. And it was a decision he'd never completely settled in his own mind with any degree of certainty either. He figured that's pretty much how Sasuke felt now.
"You stop thinking about what's right for you and start thinking about others. If you make this decision selfishly, it will never sit right in your conscience."
"It's not that easy."
"The life changing decisions never are I guess, that's kinda the point. But I'm not gonna tell you what to do because I'm gonna be bias and you probably won't listen anyway. But the other you said: you have to decide this for yourself anyway, otherwise it'll be meaningless."
Sasuke closed his eyes and sighed. "You know, for a moron you are disturbingly deep sometimes."
Naruto smiled, "Yeah well, for an asshole you can be surprisingly nice sometimes. You must have some idea what you want."
"I need to think things through. I will decide tomorrow where my life will lead me. But I know what I want right now, for tonight at least, even if it turns out to be for the last time."
"Yeah? What's that?"
His eyes looked a lot clearer when he opened them this time. It was like in the woods when he realised what he wanted to do, that he wanted Naruto to find him.
"You."
Naruto could feel that coiling anticipation in his stomach but he desperately didn't want things to end now. Right now he would have felt whole and almost total bliss if he didn't have the nagging little thought in the back of his mind that once this ended he wouldn't feel so happy or secure.
Sweat soaked bodies slid against each other as Sasuke rocked them together, his head buried in the side of Naruto's neck occasionally making those delicious sounds that never failed to make Naruto's brain and heart spark.
He could hear his own heart beating loudly in his ears and realised that the reason Sasuke was pressed up against him so firmly was so that he could feel the rapid beat of it himself as well.
"Sas…Sasuke slow down. I…don't want it to…"
He didn't have to finish. Already at an agonisingly slow pace, Sasuke slowed down further his hips moving incredibly slowly and smoothly every time he pushed in further.
Sasuke had to know the reason behind the request. He also must realise this might be the last time they were together too.
Sasuke hadn't talked about what he would decide to do from here and Naruto wanted this, this not knowing, to last forever. If he didn't know, he couldn't be disappointed. If this went on forever he could be happy forever. When this stopped Sasuke might leave him again.
"Slower…please…"
TBC
Notes: So yeah, you saw right, this isn't the last chapter as promised. I'm not sure if that will make people happy or angry, but this is just how it turned out. Basically the final chapter was getting too long. That's really all there was to it. Oh and I was a little stuck on the last half of the chapter too which contributed a bit. So not wanting for you all to have to wait even longer for one massive chapter I broke it down into two parts so you would get this part quicker. The chapter is a tiny little bit on the small side and probably seems even smaller considering the bulk of it was one long monologue for the most part, but it's not the smallest chapter I've posted for dreams so it's not that small. At least next chapter we can start new with a fresh scene. Next chapter will definitely be the conclusion and we will open with a big confrontation.
But enough about that, there are a few people who will have been smirking through a lot of this chapter because yep, you called it. There were a lot of people who thought Itachi was behind the dreams and you were more than half right as it turns out. Yay.
Oh and just a side note about RM: Part 2 was still sent for beta with this chapter even though it didn't turn out to be the last. So as soon as I get it back I will post so please don't hurt me yet :) If I don't get it back soon I will post anyway and attempt to edit it myself.
Review Comments unsigned or particularly relevant to the chapter:
Mochiusagi - you almost repeated verbatim in your review of chapter 11 about what each of the dreams meant to from the scene above which had already been written at that point, hence my reaction to your review lol.
Ugottalongway2go – Yep, subconscious, you called it :)
LostForever – yep, you called subconscious too, nice guess!
SweetXsunshine – you were spot on, an Uchiha did put the genjutsu on him some time ago. Itachi no less. And he totally was exploiting both his greatest weakness and desire.
Yu-chan – sorry I didn't reply to your review at the end of the last chapter, I had a brain dead moment. So anyway, now you get replies for both chapters. First off, yay indeed for smut. Had to happen, what can I say even if it might have been on the milder side. I made your eyes twitch? I hope that was a good result of the teasing lol.
Yup, I have a shower fetish. I'm thinking to make it a trend in any multi-chaptered fic I write now to have one shower scene in it. Have I written on for WNL? If not: note to self.
Yay, blacky made it onto your list? Wow, I will have to make an even crazier character for you and see if I can't top it in the future lol.
Oh and you can't kill me yet, one more chapter to go. And besides killing me will only make me stronger ;) And hey, you were half right with Itachi, more than half right since he was the one who started it, so your want to kill me should only be half-hearted now lol.
I can never seem to fit 'Sasuke' and 'romantic' into the same mindset. And honestly I never want to. He doesn't seem to me to be the terribly romantic type and in the two fics I've had Sasuke admit to being in love with Naruto (when he has command of all his faculties and memories) its always been dragged out in frustration. I'm glad you like it that way too so thanks for mentioning it.
My cliffhangers are designed to make people hate me and want to burn my house down and look, it works! Haha.
Glad you liked the Sasuke reveal too.
So you got your wish, there is another chapter. Perhaps it was my unconscious desire to fulfil that wish that was making this chapter too long lol.
Crayolanostalgia – again, as with Yu-chan, sorry I forgot to reply last chapter, I was in a rush and a brain dead headspace. But, better late than never huh.
Firstly, thanks! Oh and Kanran orchids have a sort of musky/citrusy kind of smell. They grow in Japan if my memory serves and if my failing memory is right at all I think they are a coldish season orchid. But I can't remember with absolute conviction on that one.
Ah yes, learning with faint overtones of smut, I don't know why this method of learning isn't used more haha.
Segent thought – Thanks muchly! Well again you were more than half right with the Itachi guess after all and look this is still the second to last chapter after all. Haha, I really mustn't underestimate my own ability to make my chapters longer than I first guess lol. So more one to look forward to!