Disclaimer: I own nothing, damn it all. I don't own Naruto, belongs to Kishimoto-sensei.
Chapter 18
Naruto could only see red, the chakra from Kyuubi was coursing through him fully, but with the full fusion it wasn't going to leave the impending marks on his skin or change his appearance. But the violent, burning, popping, and bubbling chakra whirled around him and through him. His glare was hateful, enraged, but his stance was lax, calm, it had to be unsettling, and seeing that smug smirk die from Madara's stolen face, it proved to be so.
Control was not what anyone expected from Uzumaki Naruto, and the fact that he was using control was in itself unnerving. He'd bristled but held still when Sasuke slumped to lie on his side on the ground. His focus had to remain on the threat to Sasuke, the enemy that had caused him harm.
Kyuubi growled in his mind, Kit, don't attack first, your mate is behind him and very vulnerable. Stay focused on him and I will focus on keeping us alive.
Naruto let out a very low growl and gave a curt nod and Madara moved to the side, but Naruto still remained perfectly still. Madara had to move further from Sasuke before Naruto could attack. But he refused to glance at Sasuke to give Madara the knowledge that Sasuke was why he had yet to attack.
Naruto tensed when Madara began to form katas and he jumped out of the way just before a thick ball of fire came straight for him. He was forced to jump away again as another followed. Naruto dodged them quickly while thinking, Geeze, for an ancient guy, I expected something more unique.
He moved out of the way and Naruto turned on the ball of his foot when the flames were suddenly aimed for Sasuke's unconscious body. Naruto lunged and felt the heat burn his back as he shielded Sasuke from the attack with his own body. Naruto turned while knelt down and let out a yell of anger towards Madara causing him to crash into the cave wall. Taking that moment he gathered Sasuke up in his arms and made his way out of the cave. He leapt off the ledge outside the cave entrance and fell into the forest below, moving with the speed of the jonin he was from limb to limb.
He knew Madara was on his trail, he took a chakra repressor from his pocket, Sasuke was going to kill him for putting it on him, but he did so to better hide the Uchiha in his arms from the ancient, psychotic one tailing them. He stopped just long enough to create a few doppelgangers who immediately back tracked to stall Madara enough for him to get Sasuke somewhere safe.
He found a thick brush and laid Sasuke down on the ground turning and jumping back to the limbs, creating more doppelgangers along the way to fend off his trail. He couldn't let Madara know where he was at the moment, not until he'd moved away. He felt the sharp pang of three of his copies being killed and leapt back towards the mountain where Madara was.
Then he was forced to jump to the sky as the limb he landed on only feet from Madara erupted in blue flames, a lightning induced fire jutsu. He landed on another tree limb and lunged, his fist aimed at Madara, who easily dodged and would have flipped him, had Naruto not have pulled a move Sasuke was known for, aiming a kick at Madara's midriff. Then when that was blocked, another punch, and the momentum that created being used to force the two of them to collide with the trunk of a nearby tree.
Naruto broke away, leapt back, and turned on the ball of his foot on the limb, a rasengan in his right hand. He missed, but another doppelganger Madara hadn't seen him create kicking Madara forward to be met with a direct hit from another rasengan. But then a poof made Naruto turn just in time to dodge a dangerously close kunai. It landed in the tree with a thunk and he jumped back in time to avoid the bomb detonating and casting the tree in those blue flames once again.
Naruto dropped from the limb, his hands grabbing hold of it to swing back up with both feet poised in a kick as Madara lunged at him with a lightning blade. Naruto didn't bother to try and decipher how in the hell the ancient Uchiha had gotten the technique he knew Kakashi had been the one to create. His kick landed, but another poof.
Naruto sharpened his sense, he had to stop fighting the damn copies and find the real one. He created two more doppelgangers, one heading towards the mountain, the other further east than where Sasuke had been taken to a place to hide. He couldn't completely avoid that area of the forest or Madara would know instantly that he'd hidden Sasuke there.
Finally, allusive, deceitful, irritating old Uchiha, Naruto finally sensed the real location of Madara. He was trying to make a run for it, heading towards the edge of the forest. Naruto growled low in his throat. Like hell you are going to run bastard. He headed off after him with the speed only the Kyuubi's vessel possessed forcing Madara to stop just before reaching the forests' edge.
Naruto cut him off in his path, a smug smirk on his face in a very foxy grin. "Running away?"
Madara glared at him, but the Sharingan wasn't threatening at all, a trait of fusing with a centuries old fox demon granted Naruto. The red highlights in his hair were contrasting to his blond hair, the sharp, defined canines, the deadly nails, the confident aura, reminding Madara of why he didn't truly wish to fight the jinchuriki in a less than perfect state. Naruto's scent all over the forest had left him incapable of even trying to sense Sasuke's chakra.
Using the Sharingan left him weary and exhausted, plus this body he was in was not a full blooded Uchiha like Sasuke which made it even more taxing to use the traits of the Uchiha clan. Unfortunately, he hadn't picked up anyway to bring back much needed chakra, that had ended when the last of a clan that had once been a teammate to Sasuke had died.
He never had the time nor need to seek out the secret to their ability to reproduce chakra, but at the moment, against the seemingly endless amount of chakra the fox demon possessed and his exuberant vessel, he stood little to no chance.
That had been the reason he had waited until the jinchuriki had left the village to attack and take what he wanted. But he still had yet to gain anything other than his descendants livelihood, dignity, pride, and shatter what sanity he had possessed. That made him smirk in victory, even if it would lead to his death, a eternal death, he had gotten his revenge. That would cause both of them pain and torment enough for him.
Naruto saw the smirk, time spent around Sasuke made him see the victorious gleam in Madara's eyes. His anger spiked and in a flash he had Madara pinned against the trunk of a tree by his throat. Naruto snarled, his voice laced with venom, "What the fuck are you so smug about?"
Madara laughed shortly, "He's broken boy, you're too late to save him now."
Naruto let him go and stepped back away from Madara, a dangerous look in his eyes that made Madara focus on him. In the blink of an eye Naruto had performed the katas for Body Flicker Jutsu. Madara was forced to activate the Mangekyo Sharingan to see him. By the time he saw Naruto moving around him he was getting hit with a technique he never would have guessed Naruto to be able to use. The technique his father had been known for, the Flying Thunder God, rendering Madara unable to retaliate.
An angry yell hit him as Naruto moved with a speed Madara couldn't detect or defend against that had him on the ground one second and in the air the next. Following Madara being knocked in the air he was then struck with at least thirty simultaneous punches and kicks. The air was forced from his lungs as he was slammed into the ground. He grunted as he got to his feet coughing up blood at the same time. His eyes scanned the area for Naruto, who was still just blinking across his vision.
[How did such a boy become so fast? By the time he finished his thought he barely registered Naruto moving in behind him. He quickly performed the katas for substitution jutsu and avoided a Wind Release: Great Breakthrough technique. If it wasn't for the Sharingan he would have been hit and wouldn't have even known what had hit him.
He didn't have time to do much else except copy Naruto's katas for the Water Release: Gunshot technique. Then using the Sharingan he saw that Naruto was already performing another jutsu, the Guided Windmill Triple Blades. Madara just managed to dodge the jutsu by jumping up into a tree. Why can't I find him, where the hell is this brat getting all of this strength from?
He leapt from the limb he was standing on in just enough time to dodge one of Naruto's signature moves, the Rasengan. He turned in midair just in time to block a series of blows from Naruto. Madara countered the blows, only to have Naruto block them and then counter with speed Madara knew only those trained in Taijutsu possessed. He was kicked in the stomach and the force of the blow sent him straight through a line of trees.
Madara was just getting to his feet when he looked sharply in front of him to see a red eyed Naruto walking towards him. Madara fully activated the Sharingan, this time performing the katas in a blinding show of speed for Tsukiyomi. He was pleased that Naruto had stopped, entrapped in the genjutsu. But Madara was surprised yet again when he saw that Kyuubi was grinning at him from behind a confused Naruto. With a earth shaking growl from the fox the genjutsu ended before it had even begun.
Madara could sense the anger rising in Naruto once realization hit him that Madara had used a genjutsu on him. Naruto glared darkly at him, "You bastard," he half growled. The reason behind his anger is that in being entranced by the genjutsu had invoked Kyuubi into realizing and telling him that the same genjutsu had been used on Sasuke. That same technique had been what had driven Sasuke to leave when Itachi used it and was why Sasuke was currently in the state of mind he was currently in.
The anger he felt spiked to the point where Kyuubi had taken over, rage filling the demon as well, and the blood spraying to drench his clothes, hair, his face and skin, had forced Naruto to blanch. His red eyes blinking back to blue allowing him to access what he'd just done.
His vision had swam and was blindingly red when the rage had taken over. Madara was barely recognizable, he didn't know how long it had taken to rip Madara apart, limb from limb. He couldn't look away from the gore laid out at his feet, the blood drenched all over him and the ground.
Naruto swallowed forcing down the urge to be sick, and looked at his hands, the claws had flesh and blood embedded in them, his hands covered in warm, slick blood that made the nausea even stronger. One hand was still gripping the remains of Madara's arm and he dropped it with disgust flooding through him.
Naruto had killed before, he was a shinobi, it was part of the job, but that brutality was not something he had even done before. His heart raced, he was shaking, and he would have fallen from the tree himself if Kyuubi hadn't of growled and forced him to focus. Kit, your mate needs you, medical attention, and much else. Get to him, burn the filth below you and move it.
Naruto jumped down from the tree and took out a chakra seal and a jutsu slip to cause flame jutsu since it wasn't his element and placed it on Madara's form. He tapped the strips of paper with his finger, igniting and activating them with his chakra before he leapt back a few feet. The body was engulfed in flames and then the chakra flows he could now nearly taste bitterly on his tongue were extinguished and what should have been a charred mess of what used to be a person was gone.
Naruto absently cleared the area of all evidence and then briskly moved through the forest back to where one of his doppelgangers waited for him to arrive. Naruto dismissed his doppelganger and knelt down next to Sasuke. His breath caught now that he was actually looking at him. He was so thin you could see his ribs, and the burn scars, cuts, lashes that marred the once perfect, pale skin made anger fill him once more.
How in the fuck could that . . . fuck.He bent down to gather Sasuke in his arms and stiffened when Sasuke tensed and moved away quickly. Naruto looked at him as he backed against a tree, a glare in place, but Naruto couldn't see the usual fire in those obsidian eyes. He knew Sasuke too well, could smell the fear coming off him. Naruto didn't move, he took a deep breath and felt a painful jab in his chest when Sasuke flinched from that alone.
Naruto met Sasuke's eyes, regardless of how much it hurt him to look into the hazed, frightful, pained dark eyes. Then he said in a steady, calm voice, "Sasuke, it's me, it's Naruto."
Sasuke remained quiet, he fell very still, all shaking from before ceasing, but the fear was still there, the doubt still burned strongly. But he slumped against the tree, Naruto inched closer and found himself being forced to stay still when the shard of a sword flew past him, grazing his cheek. There was a fire in Sasuke's eyes, survival. Kyuubi whispered softly to Naruto in his mind.
Kit, he's not in his right mind, there are thoughts of a nightmarish world, most likely the work of the Mangekyo Sharingan. You will have to knock him out if you want to get him taken care of.
Naruto gave a very slight nod, agreeing with the demon, in the blink of an eye he was behind the tree Sasuke was leaned against. Sasuke jerked from the blow to the back of his neck and then started to fall forward. Naruto was in front on him instantly, pulling him into his arms and lifting him as he stood on his own feet. He scaled the tree without a second thought and made his way through the forest, he needed to get Sasuke some medical attention and quick, if Kyuubi's warnings on his health was any indication at all.
The entire way to the village where Naruto had been staying lately Kyuubi did not help the worried knot in his gut. Kit, that bastard may have been right, his mental signals are jumbled, his emotions are not registering at all to say the least.
Naruto growled low in his throat, Shut up already fox, I know that much just from looking at him. You've been dormant most of the time and being painfully human alerts me to when my lover is in torment alright? The fox scoffed and laughed at Naruto's angry and demanding voice. But instead he decided to curl up in his cage and pout because he truly couldn't do much now fully fused with his vessel without causing himself harm.
Naruto ran past the inn he was staying at and nearly blindsided a villager walking across the street. He yelled out an apology and didn't stop until he stood in front of the make shift infirmary in the small non-ninja village. It would have to do until he could think of something else.
He quickly went inside, being reminded of the blood all over him when a nurse at the desk gasped in horror at him. Naruto didn't bother to look ashamed, worry the only thing etched in his face. The nurse rushed over to him and glanced at Sasuke in his arms, her plump face paling. She had brown hair and was wearing blue scrubs, she was well rounded reminding Naruto breifly of Chouji.
She asked after a moment, "What are the injuries?"
Naruto took a deep breath, "I'm fine, but I couldn't tell you what's wrong with him. Just help him alright?"
She nodded and called an orderly over, they brought a hospital bed over and Naruto reluctantly laid Sasuke down. When he tried to step back to give them room he startled by the vice grip around his wrist that startled him enough to remain more than the strength of the grip. It felt like the grip of a child, not a heavily trained ninja and he felt a weight in his chest from the lack of actual strength in that grip.
He was still in shock at seeing Sasuke so very weak, so sickly looking, nothing like the proud Uchiha he had always been, this was worse than when he'd found him in Kumogakure. He freed his wrist only, the sight of blood and bones on that hand that held his wrist despite the agony it must cause chilling his blood. He bent down kissing Sasuke's forehead gently and stubbornly remained at Sasuke's side as he was wheeled through two double doors and into a mess of white, blinding white, the stench of the hospital making Naruto scrunch up his nose.
Naruto sighed when he was forced to stay behind after a doctor inspected him and wheeled him off to surgery saying something about trying to mend crushed bones and broken ones. Naruto slumped down in a chair against the wall of the hallway close to the O.R. The nurse from before standing before him, "We need to get some information from you."
Naruto looked up at her, his features showing him to look older than his twenty years, making him look so terribly old a look of sympathy passed over her face and softened her brown eyes. Naruto sighed, "We're ninja, Konoha ninja to be exact. Uzumaki Naruto is me, Uchiha Sasuke is him."
She wrote that down on her clipboard with a nod and then she looked at him once again. "Uzumaki-san, this hospital isn't equip to deal with injured nin's, is there someone from your village we can contact . . . " she stopped at the pained expression that briefly passed over his face.
He ran his hand down his face with a heavy sigh, "I don't even know if they would respond. But do you even know of how to contact a ninja village?"
She nodded, "Yes, as the only non-ninja village with an infirmary we have ways to contact them."
Naruto nodded, "Then send a message asking for Haruno-san to Suna and Konoha please."
She nodded with a gentle smile, "Hai, Uzumaki-san, I shall do that. Please try to relax, I'm sure your friend will be fine."
Naruto nodded absently and she turned and walked away not expecting an answer. She seemed experienced with dealing with ninja, assuming none of them truly talked all that much to begin with. But for Naruto, not talking was worrisome to those that knew him. He leaned his head back against the wall and closed his eyes, all he could do at the moment was wait.
Eight Hours later . . .
Waiting was overrated, and not something Naruto was good at. He paced across the floor as he had been doing since Sasuke's angry yell had forced him from his nap that had lasted no more than twenty minutes. Sasuke had cried out twice since then and now for the last four hours he was completely silent. The yell he was accustomed to, but the pain laced cries chilled him to the bone and made him worry even more.
He jumped and froze mid-step with a scream tore through the hall from the room at the end. Naruto clenched his hands into fists, that scream, he could not handle hearing that. His blood chilled and he felt a stomach curling shudder run through him. He recalled the last time he heard Sasuke scream, he had feared for his best friend/rival back then and now he feared for him even more. But even worse was the rage that filled him at the sound, he'd become very protective and possessive of Sasuke within the time they were finally together.
Now, after months of worrying about him, weeks of searching, to hear that scream again. He lunged forward, his anger hazed mind not registering the chakra behind him or the hand on his shoulder until he felt that calming chakra course through him. He looked over his shoulder to find a familiar, sisterly, pink haired kunoichi standing behind him. She was showing a little bit being now five to six months pregnant he believed. But he wouldn't dare focus on her swelling stomach, she could still hit him just as hard, pregnant or not.
It still made him inwardly curse, the damn teleportation justu, but he then turned to find that Tsunade was right behind her as well as Iruka. Naruto smiled at them and then let Sakura guide him to a chair and sit him down. She managed to kneel down in front of him with her hands on his knees in a comforting gesture.
"Naruto-nii, look at me." He did so grudgingly, he hated for anyone to see him as anything else but his cheerful, energetic self. He knew she could see the worry lines on his face, that she could see the fear for the worst in his darkened blue eyes, the heavy emotions making them a deep blue instead of the oceanic blue they usually were. She smiled gently and said carefully, "He will be alright, especially with Tsunade-sama and me here. So don't give up on him alright."
Naruto nodded and took a deep breath, she stood up and he felt Iruka sit down next to him a supportive arm over his shoulder. Naruto sighed and gave Iruka a weak smile before leaning into his father figures embrace. Naruto faintly heard Sakura and Tsunade walk down the hall towards the room at the end before his eyes closed and Kyuubi growled low in his mind Ne, kit, that pink thing damn her . . .
Five days later . . .
Naruto would never say he hated Tsunade, not even in jest. She had overridden the other elders and council members grunts and threats about bringing Naruto and Sasuke back to the village. But she had nearly made him take back that promise when she wouldn't let him see Sasuke until two days after arriving back in the village. He was still sitting outside the room, waiting to see Sasuke, who was awake, not wholly well yet, in the psyche ward to top it off, and having to hear him yell and rant from his spot in a chair outside the door only seeded his anger even more.
Finally, two hours later and silence ensued and Tsunade stepped out of the room, looking as old as she really was with the expression on her face. She sighed heavily at Naruto as she closed the door behind her and looked wearily at him.
Naruto sighed, "Baa-chan, I know he's not exactly stable, and he's a bastard by nature, not too mention a proud one. But why in the hell did I have to stay away from him for so long?"
Tsunade yawned, "Naruto-gaki," she said tiredly and sat down in the chair to his right. She'd been going non stop, the only one close to being able to get within ten feet of the very angry Uchiha in the hospital room. He had to be kept constantly sedated, and he had the tendency to do whatever he could to stop anyone from getting near him. Trays, utensils, I.V.'s, anything he could grab was thrown and used as a weapon. Then he would bite, claw, kick, yell, and frankly he was acting like stubborn child to her.
But after the initial examination, she couldn't expect anything else. He was doing well enough to remember how to do that, or the fact that his name was Sasuke Uchiha. The mental, emotional, and physical stress and abuse he'd been through in the time he was gone was something even Ibiki didn't know if the Uchiha could pull through. He didn't recognize Sakura, he fought Tsunade, he refused to hear the name Naruto, and he dove into his own mind when anything about the Uchiha clan was mentioned, Madara, Itachi, his own name. Naruto's name calmed him almost immediately, but then he would shut out everything diving even deeper into his mind.
Trying to tell him he was a ninja resulted in angry shouts, and objects flying through the air. He'd lost his precision with throwing anything with his hands mangled to what they were. It would take months of therapy to mend his left hand, and if it wasn't for updated healing techniques through Sakura and salves from Hinata, he wouldn't have anything to speak of in his left hand. His broken bones would luckily heal well enough and not cause any permanent damage. But healing the burns on his skin, the marks and cuts on his entire body had been too much for Sakura to bear.
Sasuke had been her teammate, her teenage crush for years, to see him weakened, painfully thin, and scarred in ways she knew were from inhuman torture methods just from being an experienced medic nin, she couldn't handle it. So Tsunade had taken up the task, mostly because she cared greatly for the Uchiha's teammates and knew how much it hurt them that he was in such a state.
She had come to respect the young man, but right now she was close to strangling him, just out of frustration of not being able to do anything to help or better his condition. He had a very long, and hard road to go down. Thanks to Naruto running off, he was going to get a lot of off time from his missions. She had refused the elder and councils' requests to demand he be stripped of his rank and status but had conceded that he remain on the currently inactive nin list for a while. That she had agreed to after assessing just how bad off Sasuke truly was.
The genjutsu used on him had been recent and had come close to shattering his sanity, but there was a small amount of hope still there, a small piece of sanity he hung onto. Naruto knew the effectiveness of the jutsu was something only those with the Mangekyo Sharingan had. The Dark Illusion: Hell Viewing Technique and Tsukiyomi. Both had been used by Itachi and he'd seen the effects and gotten the explanation from Kakashi. That was why she had agreed, the small piece of sanity was sitting next to her looking at her expectantly.
She sighed, "You have to listen, and listen well gaki, I am tired and old, so I am only saying this once. You are under strict regulations for the remainder of time it takes to help Sasuke-kun recover. He has to be watched constantly because of his state of mind and you because you were close to being listed as a defected nin. A jonin will be moving in with you, one of my choosing, to help you monitor Sasuke-kun once he is released. The council wants to keep him here, but neither Sakura-chan, you, nor myself agree with that. He will only get worse that way. You can't leave him alone, no matter what. Stay by his side at all times, make sure he eats, no matter what, three meals a day. Three square meals, not just ramen. And above everything else, keep one thing in mind," she turned serious golden eyes to him and he locked eyes with her out of instinct.
"Remember how much you love him, regardless of how rough it gets, how hard it becomes, his actions, his words, right now he is not himself. Remember that you love him."
Naruto swallowed and nodded, "Hai," came a raspy whisper from him. She nodded, patted his shoulder and stood up. She looked at him with a smile and bent down, tilting his chin and kissing his forehead briefly before standing, "Good, now go see him gaki and I will send Sakura-chan up later with release forms and all that fun."
Naruto smirked and watched her walk away before he stood and took a few deep breaths. He turned to the door and his hand held the doorknob tightly, he didn't know what to expect, and from the weariness in Tsunade's voice he knew he was in for some emotional pain and mental stress.
This was likely to be one of the hardest things he would ever have to do, facing a broken, vulnerable, out of his mind Sasuke. The man he loved was hurting, something he could never stand with anyone let alone someone he loved so much it hurt, and there was absolutely nothing he could do to make the pain stop.