A/N: And here is the long awaited final installment of It's Time to Let it Go! I'll have a few details about the sequel at the end of the chapter, so please be sure to read them.

I would like to dedicate this chapter to every reviewer (constant and one-timers), everyone who favourited it and those who alerted. I can't thank you all enough, and if I had the time I would go into more detail, but for now, I'll just name you all. AnimeForeverL0ver, anime-angel98, anime-liker92, aquarius15, asmin44, Ayame Suzumiya, Bakura From School, brightgreenskribbles, Brown-Eyed Angel1234, ChocolateCherries, ColorsOver, dancingthefoxxchalk, DaniUchiha, Darkblacknightmare, Dragonmanga, emoprincess221, GinsengS, Jao Ensatsu Kokuryuha, Kai-Chan94, KARASU25, Kat Whaat, ktrokks12, kuzon234ray, laila and her wolf, Leon, Little Miss Spell-of-the-Week, maikchom, MINX is impressed, moonlesslife, nagoto, NEC17, poisonxivory, psycopathiccat, Ravendo, RoanMoon, Roaven Wulf, Sakari Black, sasuke's-emo-lover, seaofshadow, se-tar, shikalicious, silver919, SilverMoon888, Singing-star-6, Soularia Reed, SufficientxEnough, The-Devil's-Dealer, Uchiha Babe, valdas, Whats7My4Name5Again, xxNEESHxx, XxtaintedflamexX, xXUchiaXx, yaonne-san, Yin's Crescent, yukiihiimechan.

O.O Woah… I so love you all!

Chapter XXXV

The next week Sasuke had to stay in the hospital was probably the dullest of his life. The cold, sterile rooms with whitewash walls were enough to drive anyone crazy; and people wondered why the Uchiha was so crabby when the visited.

Neji and Tenten stayed with him almost constantly, and since they took the week off from school, it was for hours on end. Not that Sasuke was complaining… much. But he barely had ten minutes to himself, which was beginning to grate on his already frazzled nerves.

After school let out, his room was often like a three-ring circus. Everyone, which is barely an exaggeration, seemed to visit him. Hell, even most of his teachers came to see him, if only to torture him by giving him homework. He didn't want to get too behind on work, did he?

And often every evening, much past visiting hours, Itachi came to him. They would often talk of unimportant things, sometimes reminisce, but never talked of their first night conversation. So they played it safe and talked of boring matters, requiring little to no actual brain input.

Of course, Nox was always there, and though cats (or any animal of any sort) were strictly forbidden, he had managed to woo the nurses into letting him stay. He'd leave for a few hours, through the always-open window, then come back, often acting fairly happy with himself.

And just when Sasuke would finally find himself alone (with the exception of Nox), a nurse just had to pop in to see how he was doing. But Sasuke would just clench his teeth and bare with it, they just cared is all. Something Sasuke could hardly fathom as to why, but it seemed to be one of those things he was never meant to understand.

By Tuesday morning, Sasuke was so bored that he tried moving. It was surprisingly difficult, though he should not have been surprised at the fact. The boy was no longer hooked up to every machine known to man. In fact, the only thing connected to him was an IV. He couldn't eat because of the damage to his intestines, and he was still recovering from the surgery to his stomach. But the doctor, who only visited with him once a day, had said later that day they might be able to take it out and have him try some easily digestible food.

The Uchiha was panting with the effort of trying to push himself up, with only one arm, mind, because the other was in a cast. But he finally sat, back against the headboard, with a triumphant smirk on his face. He was sick of being so helpless, of being too weak to even sit up on his own. So being able to sit up by his self was a huge accomplishment.

Just a day later, Wednesday morning, when he was –surprisingly- blissfully alone, he decided to push himself a little bit further. May not have been the smartest thing, but the infernal bleakness of the room was slowly depriving him of his sanity. Not that he had much to begin with, but that is beside the point.

The point was that despite his almost completely useless right leg, he tried to stand. And through his unfailing willpower alone, he was able to stand and not fall right back onto the bed or collapse in a heap on the floor. But just standing drained him of his small amount of energy, and he stood for as long as he possibly could until he physically could no longer stand, then fell back onto the bed.

He liked to delude himself and pretend it was for longer then it really was, which was barely two minutes. But it was progress. Much needed progress.

He kept doing these short exercises every time he was alone, and gradually strength began to return to him. He was very careful about the amount of pressure he put onto his right leg; he really didn't want to damage it more than it already was.

The many scratches littering his body healed quickly, and the only ones that now required new bandages was the one on his forehead and the two on his abdomen. He looked less like a broken toy, covered in bandages, and more of a human being.

The only thing the boy could really occupy his mind with was homework, for the first few days, because nobody would remember to bring him a sketchbook. But after Neji noticed how utterly restless the boy was, he brought over a few books and a "Rubik's cube". (1)

The books were finished very soon after they were received, and the hand puzzle was the source of much more entertainment. Not for Sasuke, no, but for anyone else in the room. After just a few minutes after he picked it up, insults and swearing followed.

And it made the boy no happier when everyone else seemed to be able to solve it, except him. Even after Naruto played with it for a few minutes, it was solved. Suffice to say, that toy soon met its maker when it was skillfully thrown out the window after Sasuke declared it unsolvable.

At the end of the weekend, the doctor was astounded with the boy's progress and how well he was healing. He got Sasuke some crutches and said if he could walk down the hall, relatively steadily and pain-free, then he would agree to discharge the boy by Wednesday at the very latest.

He was able to do it, with only a small break halfway through, and was especially grateful that a few days previous Neji had been kind enough to stop by his home and get him some actual clothes to wear, instead of the gown he was given.

Tuesday evening Sasuke found out who would be taking care of him. He didn't like the words "taking care" or "babysitting" so he liked to believe they were just going to visit.

It turns out it was going to be Iruka Umino –the man with the scar across his nose, Sasuke later found out- who was Naruto's foster father figure, but he couldn't take any more time off of work. He also had learned the hard way that Naruto wasn't to be trusted home alone, for any amount of time.

So Kakashi, who had tenure and could afford to miss a few days, would move in with Sasuke. And this was done without his permission or consent. But when Kakashi had told him about it, it had sounded like he was about as happy with the situation as Sasuke was.

The whole decision had been the investigator's idea. Because apparently, along with two college degrees, Kakashi also had attended and passed the police academy, but decided not to pursue the career when he realized how much work the job included.

And so, when the investigator explained the situation to Kakashi, the man had reluctantly agreed. But the benefits for the man were an excellent added bonus. Sasuke's place was much larger than his own studio apartment, and the fact that he didn't have to go to work for a while helped.

Despite being angry at not having any say in the matter of someone staying at his house, Sasuke was happier that it was someone he actually knew instead of someone's parent that he didn't know at all. And since he wanted out of the boring as sin hospital, he didn't care that much.

So Kakashi made arrangements to pick Sasuke up after school, and after he stole Sasuke's key, he left to move some of his things to his new home, for the next couple of weeks anyway. Sasuke was then alone, but not for long.

Itachi listened patiently to Sasuke's explanation of his situation. He found that he liked that idea, if only because Kakashi was somewhat trained and would probably be able to protect the boy, if needed. But with Kakashi there, he's not get to actually visit Sasuke in quite a while, which he hoped Sasuke could deal with. When he voiced his concern, Sasuke frowned, but nodded, understanding the necessity behind the request.

Itachi smiled and promised to keep in touch anyway he could. And the only way he to stay in touch without a paper trail (physical or electronic) was through the telephone. Even then it wasn't totally reliable. Cell phone signals are easily scrambled and intercepted, and Itachi couldn't give his number to anyone, as it was constantly changing.

Itachi promised he'd think of something, and let the boy sleep. He stayed there beside the bed, for only God knows how long, thinking of how he just got his brother back and was loosing him again. Not know that the other Uchiha was thinking things along similar lines before he gave into the black tug of sleep.

"I'll figure something out… Promise."

The next day found Sasuke in a better mood then he'd been the entire time there in the hospital. Not only would he be getting out of the stupid hospital, but also he had more energy than he'd had in a while.

When Neji and Tenten came that morning, they told him they were leaving. They had already taken a week and a half off from school and their various jobs, and they didn't need to get into trouble of fired.

Tenten made Sasuke promise he's call, at least once a day, until he was totally better. Sasuke humoured her and said he would, but one look exchanged between Sasuke and Neji was enough to tell the latter that the former was lying through his teeth. Tenten noticed the look and thwapped them both over the head, to which Sasuke promptly (and rather dramatically) placed his hands over his heart and reeled back in shock and mock hurt, proclaiming how dare she hit an injured man?

She glared at the boy in the bed, who just gave her a cocky smirk in return, then to her boyfriend who was trying and failing to quell his shaking shoulders. She thwapped him again and sat in indignant silence until she cracked a smile herself.

Shortly after, Kakashi showed up and showed them Sasuke's discharge papers. Sasuke sighed a happy, little sigh, and grabbed for his bag that held his few belongings in it. Tenten immediately took the bag from him and shoved it into Kakashi's arms with a glare that obviously said she didn't care if he didn't want to hold it and he would have to anyways.

Sasuke rolled his eyes and stood with the support of his crutches. He nodded for them to leave, and then took up the rear as they left. He smiled a small, not-really-there smile as he as finally able to see the sky, feel the crisp air against his skin, and the light breeze that blew his hair across his face.

He sniffed, could not have asked for a better day. Clouds covered the sky with very sporadic spurts of blue; a nice, crisp wind would blow past, then settle into just a breeze before blowing again.

He was closing a chapter of his life, and though there were a few holes in his plot, he could not wait for the next chapter to begin.

-FIN-

1. I don't own Rubik's cube, but I do own a Rubik's cube! Which are damn hard, and the reason it took me so long to write this chapter… And I still didn't solve it...

A/N: And this concludes ITTLIG! For those who don't already know, THERE WILL BE A SEQUEL. I'm just going to take a little break from this, about a month or so, and I'll aim to post the first chapter by (about) June 1st. I'll be sure to add a little A/N chapter when I actually get it done and written, so all those with this on their alerts will know when it's out. Plus, I actually want to plan out this next one, which I didn't do with this one.

I just can't believe this is actually finished. It seems like yesterday that I started, and I appreciate every review, PM, and adds this gets. So, thanks everyone! And check out these stats: 216 reviews, 22 faves, 35 alerts, 37 chapters, 7609 hits, and 53,287 words! By the way, please check out my poll!

Oh, and I also have a new story out, which you should really check out, it'll be my next multi-chapter fic that I am aiming to be done before I post the first of this's sequel.

So long and thanks for all the fish!