. Yeah, I got nothing. I have no reason to start another story, but I simply can't help myself sometimes. This idea sprung up on me mid-way through my Shadows Apprentice update, and I couldn't freakin focus as a result. So, lemme lay the groundwork real fast, and then we can just dive right into this story, eh? It has it's roots in a 'what-if Sasuke never left' video I found on YouTube. So, thanks, brain. Never fear, all my stories will get updates. It's just bearing on how much of an audience shows interest into said story. Honestly, Fox, Hound and Flower might soon overtake Shadow's Apprentice as my primary story if the pace that one has keeps up

Chapter 1: Back from the brink

As the rain came pouring down on him, Sasuke felt chills run up his spine. Hunched over as he was, his face only inches away from his unconscious friend, someone who had become like a brother to him, the cold was only overshadowed by one other gnawing feeling that settled into his gut and quickly spread throughout him. You'd think, after getting what he thought he wanted more than anything, he'd feel some sense of pride. Maybe even relief that his rival hadn't surpassed him like he'd thought. But no. It was neither of those. It was disgust. But not with Naruto, no. Not with the village or with the friends who he had just earlier mocked and belittled in the midst of his anger and rage. No…it was pure disgust with himself. How had it come to this? He'd had his issues with Naruto, and the unreal pace in which he'd been able to catch up to himself in skill and power, but he'd never thought it would have reached this point. What had been going through his head? But as soon as he thought this, Itachi's face flashed through his mind. His preoccupation with his brother, that's what it had been. He wanted more than anything to obtain a power strong enough for him to take his vengeance on his brother for what he had done all those years ago to their parents, to their entire clan, leaving him to be the lone survivor. And he'd thought he was stagnating too much in the Leaf, so he'd resigned himself to leave, as hard as the choice had been.

But was that power, even if he COULD obtain it in this way worth this? Forsaking the comrades that, not even a few weeks ago he'd told Naruto that'd never wanted to see hurt or fall before him again. Consumed in the moment like he'd been, he'd contradicted those words that he'd meant with everything in him in that moment. His eyes flicked to the circular wound in Naruto's jacket and that sick, twisting feeling in his guts only grew worse. He'd used his Chidori on him without a second thought…. that was how far he'd allow himself to fall into his delusions. If not for that strange chakra that appeared afterwards, that would've been game over. He would've killed Naruto, and then what? Ultimately, would that not have left him any better than Itachi in the end? To kill his best friend just to obtain a power…. had that not been something that he'd despised his brother for since he was a child? No. He refused to allow himself to slip any further down this path, if this was what it was going to lead him to become. He WOULD obtain power, he would avenge his clan, and he would stop his brother…. but he'd do it his own way. Maybe there was something he was missing, maybe if he reached out instead of bearing the burden of his quest alone, there was a way to stay and still get stronger. One thing was certain…being slapped in the face with what he'd done, he wouldn't do it this way….chasing the empty promises of a man who'd sought to destroy and murder the people who'd he'd come to care for in their time together.

He leaned back, falling into a sitting position as he stared up at the sky, the throbbing in his shoulder from his overuse of the curse mark only now just starting to dissipate. He had to get Naruto back to the village, but how? His chakra had been exhausted, and he was in no condition to carry him. As if the universe heard his thoughts, the solution arrived moments later in the form of Kakashi and one of his ninja hounds. Of course. It was only natural that he'd be involved in trying to find them. After all, he'd already stopped them from tearing each other apart once. Though Sasuke could tell by the body language of his sensei as he approached, that this time was much different. He knelt, examining Naruto first and then turned his gaze to him. For a moment, they shared a conversation without a word. He'd warned him against this very thing, and he'd not listened. When he finally did speak, it was a low, disappointed tone. And it honestly stung worse than if he'd just been yelling. "Are you satisfied now?" he said. Sasuke bit down on the urge to be defensive, simply shaking his head. He collected his scratched headband and stuffed it into his pocket. Kakashi put Naruto on his back and let out a sigh. "Come on…we got a long way back; Naruto needs medical attention and the rains only getting worse." Sasuke nodded and the two leapt up and headed back into the forest. Such was there hurry they didn't notice the man in the black robe with red clouds, the sign of the Akatsuki watching them go.

Halfway back, a few representatives from the third medical corps found them and inquired about their condition, Kakashi informing them that though Naruto and Sasuke were both hurt, they weren't in any sort of danger. As Sasuke listened to the report from the ninja, he felt another pang of guilt as he learned the fates of the others. Shikamaru, Kiba, Neji, Choji…they'd all been hurt for his sake. And to think he'd nearly thrown that sort of sacrifice away. As one of the medics went on ahead to send word to the village to prepare for their arrival, Naruto stirred a bit, shifting on Kakashi's back. "Kakashi-Sensei…the others…Sasuke," he mumbled.

"Don't talk now, Naruto. Save your strength, alright?" Kakashi. "They'll all be okay, I promise. And Sasuke is right here," he said. Naruto's half-lidded eyes met Sasuke's and his lip twitched upwards in a vain attempt to smile. Sasuke nodded, stepping his pace up to be right beside Kakashi.

"Don't worry, alright Naruto? I'm…I'm not going anywhere. Okay?" His voice was quiet, and a bit hoarse, but he did his best to manage a sincere tone. It seemed to satisfy Naruto, and he closed his eyes again, the exhaustion once again taking over. Kakashi wanted to take some sort of comfort in this moment but found he couldn't. Not fully. Sure, Sasuke seemed to have had a last moment change of heart, but the damage done to not only the team that had been tasked to bring him home, but also his standing in the village could hardly be understated. He would try his best to mitigate the backlash. He owed his student that much, but he wasn't sure how well it would go, even with him chiming in for Sasuke. It took another couple of hours, but eventually, the walls of the village came into view, and they landed outside the gates. Two more medical corps shinobi and a member of the ANBU were waiting. Sasuke didn't need an explanation as to why that was. Kakashi handed Naruto to the medics and turned just as the ANBU approached.

"Sasuke Uchiha? Lady Tsunade has ordered me to escort you immediately to her office." Sasuke tensed up, but relaxed slightly when Kakashi stepped in.

"I'll take responsibility for getting him there. Don't worry about it. I want him to get looked at too, just to make sure everything is okay," he said. The ANBU ninja didn't seem to like that, but, seeing that Kakashi didn't intend to walk back this request, relented, and left to inform the Hokage of what he'd said. "Come on, Sasuke." Sasuke nodded and followed Kakashi to the hospital. "I don't want to mince any words with you. Were in a bit of a bind here. For all intents and purposes, you were considered a rogue ninja in all but name when you made the decision to leave. How did you get the mark through your headband?"

"Naruto. When our jutsu clashed at the very end he reached up and did it. I'd always said that he wouldn't be able to even manage that, so I guess he wanted to prove a point. So, if you're wondering if I made It like that on my own, I didn't. Not that I think it's going to matter to the Hokage when she sees it," Sasuke said. As they entered the hospital and Kakashi informed the medic he wanted Sasuke given a general examination, he didn't need his sharingan activated to sense the eyes on him. By now, word had no doubt spread to at least the other medics as to what had occurred, and he didn't anticipate that he'd be welcome here if he didn't have someone like Kakashi requesting this. The medic nodded and motioned for Sasuke to follow him. Sasuke did so but noticed about halfway down the hall that Kakashi was still hanging back at the reception desk. "You're not going to come with me?"

"I'm going to go meet with Lady Tsunade, see if I can smooth this over a little bit. And I don't think I need to tell you this, Sasuke, but just because the ANBU at the gates backed off, doesn't mean they're not going to be watching you closely. No matter what happens, don't get any more ideas of going anywhere other than to see the Hokage until this whole mess gets sorted out." Sasuke wanted to argue, but he couldn't manage one that had any sort of sound logic to them. He'd avoided an immediate incarceration, that was more than he'd expected to be granted.

"Don't worry. That won't be an issue," he said.

"I hope not. Get checked up and rest, Sasuke. I'll talk to you in a bit," Kakashi said, turning and heading outside. Sasuke let out a sigh ad allowed himself to be showed to a room. Funny. Not that long ago, he was laid up in a bed just like this after his 'fight' with Itachi if you could even really call it that. It was probably too gracious of a term because he certainly didn't term it as such. He'd been crushed like nothing underneath his brother's boot. The more things change, the more they stayed the same. The medic went to work examining him, but other than some badly bruised ribs and a cracked wrist bone, he seemed to be alright, but he was told to sit tight while they ran a few tests just to be positive nothing else was going on. Internal damage wasn't anything to mess around with. Sasuke didn't know how much time had passed, it was hard to tell with just the daylight outside, but a knock on the door jolted him out of his thoughts.

"Come in," he called. The door opened and in stepped, not a medical ninja, not Lady Tsunade, not even Kakashi. It was Sakura. He could tell by the look on her face that this wasn't going to be like the other times his pink haired teammate had come by to see him in the past, however. Her eyes were downcast, her hands clenched into fists at her side "Sakura? Are you okay?" he mumbled. She didn't reply, pulling a chair up to sit near his bed, though not beside it. A heavy silence hung between them, and he shifted a bit. This was odd behavior coming from her. He'd expected her to throw her arms around him, even if it did usually annoy him, he'd at least come to expect it. This silent treatment felt…not wrong exactly, just strange. "Sakura, what is it?" She looked up now, and he saw her eyes were narrowed in.

"What is it? Am I okay? Sasuke, how can you possibly think after all this that I could be anywhere near okay?" She demanded. He opened his mouth to reply, but he couldn't form the words before she continued. "After everything we went through as a team, all the times we were there for one another, for you to just try and throw it all away, throw me away when I was pouring my heart out to you and begging you to stay with us…did you even care? Was that 'thank you' even legitimate, or is that just something you said because you felt like you had to?"

"Of course, it was. I didn't want to leave Sakura. I genuinely didn't. But I felt like I'd peaked as far as I could being here. I felt like I had no other choice- "

"There's ALWAYS another choice, Sasuke! If you bothered to trust us with how you were feeling, we could have tried to work something out! But no, that's never been you, has it?" she sighed angrily and paused to take a breath, not wanting to fly off the handle too hard, but still so hurt and so angry for how he'd nearly left things. "Is what their saying true? Did you try to kill Naruto?" Sasuke looked down at his own hands then, not able to muster a reply. "I asked you if it was true or not. Please tell me it's not. That their wrong," Sakura said, this time her teeth were clenched, and it came off less like a question and more like an angered plea. When he again didn't answer, she knew it had to be the truth. Sasuke was a lot of things, some of them things she was blind to until today, but to think he would go that far…she felt tears prickle at the sides of her eyes, and her hands began to tremble in her lap.

"Don't worry about a thing! I'm going to bring Sasuke back. I promise that on my life, Sakura." Naruto's words echoed in her head, and she felt her heart ache at the thought that he had come so, so close to losing his life at the hands of the one he'd gone to 'rescue'. And it made her sick that she had been the one to ask that of him. But she could ask for Naruto's forgiveness later. Right now, she had to deal with this. "Do you even know what everyone went through on your behalf? Two of them are lucky to be alive. And Naruto. He never once gave up on you, you know that too, right? Even when you were apparently beating him to a bloody pulp, all that mattered to him was bringing you back home. A home you apparently thought you'd outgrown," she snapped making him wince just a bit.

"I do know. And I expect I'll get more than an earful from the Hokage. Kakashi said he was going to try and do some damage control ahead of me being there, but…. if her temper is anything like yours, I'd say I'm in trouble on that one." He'd meant it as a weak attempt at humor, but Sakura didn't so much as twitch towards having a smile. That was fair. The truth was, he knew he had a great deal to make up for. Naruto hadn't seemed to be too angry, but Naruto was also different from a lot of people. Plus, he was essentially unconscious from his wounds. Who knew what his reaction would be once he was healed and had had time to consider his response to what had happened? "I don't expect you to believe me right now Sakura…but I am sorry," he said. Sakura stood from her chair and moved it back to where it had originally sat. She couldn't stay here any longer. She had more she wanted to say, but it could wait.

"Your right. I don't believe you right now. I'm not going to just blindly take you at your word anymore, Sasuke. You see how I got rewarded for that last time. And besides even if I DID believe you? I'm not the one you owe the biggest apology to anyway." She turned and headed for the door, stopping for a second, glancing at him over her shoulder. "I'm glad you didn't leave, Sasuke. Despite everything, I didn't want you gone. But it shouldn't have taken this to get it through your skull that it wasn't the right path. Were strongest together. You used to know that, and somehow you need to re-learn it. Good luck with Lady Tsunade…you'll definitely need it," she said, closing the door behind her as she left. Sasuke let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. Some of the stuff she'd said cut deep. But nothing was unfair. She had every right to be utterly furious at him. All he could do was cross his fingers Kakashi was making some sort of headway with the Hokage.

And that'll do it for the time being. It's a tad short than the 3K minimum goal I like to shoot for with my chapters, but I think as far as intro's go, I'm satisfied with where I can go from here with it. Now, I should note, that the other pairings in this story are very up in the air besides, obviously, Narusaku. So, if you've got anything in particular you might want to see on the romance front, throw it out to me. I won't make any guarantees, that's an easy way to let someone down, but I always take feedback and requests into account when I'm planning. So as always guys, Review, follow, fave, all that good stuff. It really does wonders for this little ladies confidence, and gives me some motivation, lol. Even if you don't though, I appreciate you checking this out.

Till next time, fellow fanatics

-Elise