A/N I made some changes to the story

-I fused the chapters because 300 words chapters were too short

-I tweaked how the sharingan's powers were explained

-I added fight scenes where they ought to be

-I added some dialogue for when Sasuke enters Konoha.

Localized to a spot where, long ago, a user of the Eight Gates once felled several legendary swordsmen, a storm brewed. The boost it gives to one's lightning jutsu is well worth its hefty cost in chakra. Incidentally, it makes a great tool for finding metal objects.

"There," said Karin, pointing where the electrical energy in the air resonated with something.

That something was the pair of lightning blades, Kiba. Later that day, the group found the needle sword, Nuibari, and traces of someone else having recently been looting the area.

While the state in which the battlefield was left usually calls for many days of searching, team Hebi's method guaranteed that what they had found was all that was left.

I'm sorry Sasuke, this is it.

Why was Sasuke remembering this? This doesn't make any sense. Itachi would never say this. Especially moments before his death. Every single act of kindness by Itachi had been a lie. This one should be no different, right?

However, Sasuke was unable to believe for one second these words were a sadistic lie or anything that made sense. The Sharingan cannot be lied to; it is unable to see lies. Unlike the Byakugan, which works by seeing more, the Sharingan works by seeing less. For example while the Byakugan sees through anything and can determine an enemy's true position in spite of being in their genjutsu, the Sharingan just plain doesn't see the genjutsu.

This useful effect also has the side effect of not allowing sharingan users to lie to themselves. As a result, many high-level Uchiha, deprived of a precious mental defense mechanism and faced with the stress of ninja life, snap and go insane.

Which means that Sasuke can't help asking himself questions. Why was his brother kind to him? Why...

"Did you hear Itachi Uchiha died?"

Those words mercifully brought Sasuke back on earth. He was in a tavern after searching for swords, and two Konoha-nin were talking nearby.

"Yeah, it was his little brother, Sasuke, right? I heard he got Orochimaru, too! He's a hero"

Those words sounded shallow to Sasuke's ears. He was being praised for murder while the fact that he betrayed the village was being ignored. Oh well, Sasuke thought, that's par for the course concerning the village's opinion of me. Might as well abuse this. After all, I need a better tracking team to find those swords.

And so, he stood up from his seat and approached them.

Sasuke did not think that through.

It's not that the people of Konoha have changed their views on the Uchiha now that he has betrayed them and have started to think of him objectively. They have not. Not even close. On the contrary, it seems that they love him even more than before.

Those two Konoha-nin at the bar were enthralled to escort them to Konoha village and usher them in. Suigetsu, Karin and Jugo were included because, though they were foreign ninja and infiltration was a serious problem, they were immediately accepted on the basis that they were following Komoha's beloved hero.

After taking several detours to avoid anyone that might know him, Sasuke arrived at the Hokage's office. In it were Tsunade and Sakura, in the middle of a conversation. Tsunade was the first to identify him, and looked at him like she just heard an aggressively bad joke. Sakura had to turn around, and her eyes widened in disbelief once she saw him.

Senju Tsunade was feeling a bad headache swelling a bad headache swelling her head, and not the kind that her skill in medicine can help.

"So let me get this straight. Three years after deserting Konaha for Orochimaru, you just waltzed right back here"

"Hnn"

"Accompanied by three foreign Ninja who used to work for the snake."

"Hnn"

"And the first thing you did was enter my office unannounced."

"Hnn"

"And then, completely ignoring Sakura, who I was talking to before you interrupted, you demanded to be handed a tracking team."

"Hnn"

"SAY SOMETHING ELSE YOU ANTISOCIAL PRICK!", Tsunade yelled at Sasuke while throwing a desk lamp at him. "WHAT, DO YOU THINK THIS IS A CHARITABLE ORGANISATION!? IT'S NOT!

"Don't you think you're being a little harsh?", Sakura interjected.

"HARSH!? He BARGED IN HERE ASKING FOR HANDOUTS!" Tsunade calmed don and said to Sasuke, "No, we only help out our loyal shinobi. To the rest, we offer services, so you'll have to pay for the S-rank mission of tracking down four legendary swords.

"We don't have that kind of money!" exclaimed Suigetsu.

"Fine then," Sasuke said, "what can we do to prove our loyalty.

Tsunade smirked. "We have information that a member of the Akatsuki will be attacking Konoha soon. We would appreciate it if you tapped into your newfound habit of killing missing-nin."

Sasuke Uchiha had brought his brother's eyes to Konoha.

He wondered. Why did he bother? The only reason he wanted power was to murder his brother and that was done. The Mangekyo and Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan would be useless to him. Fratricide was his one goal in life and nothing else is going to motivate him to kill Naruto. Why then, was he still holding on to those eyes?

It was as if Itachi had made a compelling argument about the usefulness of that power. That's didn't sound right. All his brother did was monologue about he had arranged this whole situation to obtain the Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan and about how powerful he was going to be. Itachi had done this in his mad quest for power.

...Right?

Sasuke saw it with his own two Sharingan eyes. How his brother made a graphic genjutsu of how the eye transfer went. The only way a genjutsu can affect the Sharingan is if the caster truly desires the target to see it, and not as a distraction from combat or to play with their emotions. But why would Itachi bother with that? Why would he want Sasuke to know?

Was Itachi showing him how to use his eyes?

His Sharingan-imbibed memories were preventing him from thinking otherwise. Sakuke was resisting it, but those thoughts had slowly passed through his head over the past few days of waiting for the attack. They need to deal with fan-girls was, in comparison, a welcome distraction.

On that note, Sakura had been making efforts to be an actually functionnal human being around him, wich was nice. She tried having conversations with him, which Sasuke mostly ran away from. Suigetsu complained about defending a village that owed them nothing, Karin joined the ranks of the fangirls and Jugo followed Sasuke wherever.

Currently, Kakashi was sitting beside him, using the "being very close to one's personal space but not intruding it" tactic as they ate ramen together at Icharku's. His ex-teacher had noticed Sasuke being troubled by his inner demons, but knew from experience that the Uchiha wouldn't be willing to talk about it.

They wouldn't have had time to talk either, Kakashi thought, as the alarm signalling enemy attack rung and a foreign, orange-haired shinobi with several piercings appeared close to their location.

"You will tell me where Naruto is."

"Never!"

"The decision is not yours to make," the human path of Pein said as he laid his hand on the konoha shinobi in order to extract the information from his soul. However, before he could complete the action, his hand fell off. He tried to turn to look at who did this, but his head also fell off.

Pein was hoping that his Asura path would use its firepower to deal vast amounts of damage to konoha. However, the pressure dealt by the transforming berserker in front of him prevented that. Said berserker, while yelling "KILL! KILL KILL!" was saving many lives by forcing the repurposed puppeteer corpse to focus most of his firepower on him. It wasn't helping that multiple long-range shinobi had joined for support.

The Animal path was doing its job splendidly. Animals were summoned and wreaking havoc. A shinobi tried summoning a cage around him to tortutre the summoner into submission. He was so proud of himself, too, boasting his position as head of torture and interrogation. However, as this "torture" paled in comparison to true pain, he escaped easily by summoning an animal to bust him out. No sooner had he escaped that chains had enveloped themselves around him. No matter, he could jus-

No, wait. He coudn't. Those chains seemed to have special sealing properties, wich meant he was useless unless the chain's head-haired source was dealt with.

The Deva path was supposed to be Pein's stongest body. The two shinobi before him, even if they were the last sharingan users alive, shouldn't be that much of a problem to him. And yet, they were. He had difficulty hitting them, as they were on the defensive.

"Six seconds," said one to the other. Did they find out his secret? No matter, he thought, because they were off by a second. He use the almighty push to swat a giant lightning attack sent by the Uchiha, then dodged a volley of kunai. They had set this up so that another attack that only the almighty push could get rid of was sent at the five seconds mark. He surprised them with an almighty push...

And got surprised when the attack vanished. The Uchiha was in front of him, charging from outside his push's range with a lightning-enhanced hand. He managed to avoid that attack, but not the identical one that came from behind.

Pein saw that dividing his forces was not a viable strategy. He sent the Preta path to dismantle the chains on the Animal path, summon the paths back together and revived his casualties with the naraka path. At the exact same time, an orange-clad sage summoned himself into Konoha.

Naruto took in the scene with his eyes and his newly acquired nature energy sensing. Before him were six paths of the one who killed his teacher. A great battle seems to have taken place and many ninja across the village were chakra exhausted. Even though it was his first time sensing them, he recognized several of his freinds and team 7. Sakura-chan, Kakashi-sensei...

Sasuke.

Unfortunately, this was not the time to have a reunion. It was time to beat Pein.

The people of Konoha stood in awe of the battle that took place. They wanted to help, but there was not much place in that battle. They were also terrified. No one's bodies were able to move one step closer to the fight, so they ended up frozen in place.

Except for Sasuke, who tried his very best not to move. His body kept twitching forwards, but he didn't want to interfere with Naruto's chance to get revenge on the man who earned his hatred. His active Sharingan, telling him that Naruto isn't going to die and that Pein was fighting to capture, was barely keeping him in place.

Eventually, Naruto managed to defeat all but one path, who pinned him down with chakra rods. The battle seemed to be over and Pein was finishing his monologue about achieving peace through pain when Hinata showed up.

Sasuke did not understand. What was she doing, interfering with their duel? That fight was personal for Naruto, and therefore it was his right to fight alone. So why was she meddling?

"Because I love you, Naruto!", said Hinata, as if answering Sasuke's question.

Because she loved him...

Pein was about to impale Hinata with a chakra rod, but a single kunai, thrown by Sasuke's, impaled him his heart. He staggered for a moment, then fell, dead. Because kunai are your best friend when your enemy isn't looking at you.

Sasuke, having seen with his Sharingan that naruto could sense chakra, walked up to the (still pinned) Naruto and entered his mindscape.

"You can sense where Pein is, right? show me."

Naruto made a surprised look. "What will you do once you meet him?"

"I will talk to him, the same way you talk to your enemies. I believe i know what to say to change Pein's ways.

Naruto thought for a moment, then ammassed nature energy to enter sage mode. He thought he would just be showing Pein's location, but since they were in the same mindscape, they ended up sharing the experience of sensing through the chakra rods.

Sasuke stood up, ignoring the extra iris Naruto seemed to have had when their senses connected, and went on to confront the real Pein.

Pein waited patiently as Sasuke approached his location and passed through the cloak of the fake tree he and Konan were hiding. On the last Uchiha's arrival, the two doujutsu users locked their eyes together. Pein knew the dangers of doing that, but his access to Human path chakra protected him. He thought that boy would come to kill him, but his doubts are growing.

-Why have you come here?

-Because I want to know more about what you said about helping the world by making it feel pain. But most of all, I believe I understand why Hinata saved Naruto, and that reason might be what's missing in your plan.

-...Very well. I will tell you the story of the two pains that define my life.

"You have heard my story. Now let me hear your answer."

After finishing his counts of the experiences that shaped his life and his philosophy, pain looked at the boy, who seemed thoughtful. Does the Uchiha believe he has the answer to true peace?

-I see. I myself have been shaped by pain. Before I tell you my answer, I must tell you the story of the one pain that defined my life.

"Unlike you, I lived in peacetime. I lived my early childhood after the third shinobi war was over, blissfully ignorant of its realities. I was a member of a well-off clan, the Uchiha, and a loving family. I loved my father, my mother and my brother and I generally liked everyone else in my clan."

"However, my brother, Itachi, had begun acting strange. He spent almost all his time on missions. He stopped talking to father. There was his best friend's death. It was officially ruled as suicide, but there were suspicions towards Itachi.

"I ran across the compound, desperately and fruitlessly trying to find anyone. When I arrived at my house, I found another living person. Itachi, standing behind the corpses of my mother and my father. I asked him who did this, but he stood silent. Instead he activated his eyes and forced me to watch the death of every Uchiha, from the murderer's point of view."

"He told me that he did it to test his vessel. That I was not even worth killing. That if I wanted to pose a threat to him, I had to hate him with all my being and use any method to obtain power. He pointed towards a secret place in the Uchiha compound that contained the secret to making one's Sharingan stronger."

"After that, I dedicated my entire life to the murder of my own brother. I refused to enjoy my childhood, as that would get in the way. I pushed my friendship aside, as that would get in the way. I left my home village to train under a missing-nin, all to gain power. In the end, I did kill him, but I then realized there was nothing left."

Having removed everything in my life not relevant to Itachi's murder and having killed him, there was nothing left. I was in desperate need of a purpose to fill the void. I pandered to someone's dream of collecting swords even though I didn't really care about it. I came back to this village and defended it at the risk of my life, even though I didn't care for it. Maybe it was because I didn't care for my own life, either."

Pein listened to this story and also watched it, as Sasuke was using gengutsu for visual support.

"Even my past purpose is starting to falter. For so long, I've believed that Itachi was heartless, but he did things during our battle that didn't make sense. He seemed to use this opportunity to teach me the kekkei genkai he had copied, and how to obtain the eternal Mangekyo Sharingan. Even when he died, instead of going out like a villain, he made one last act of affection towards me."

"I've been wondering what this all meant, until you monologued to Naruto about your plan to obtain peace through pain during your battle. I'm starting to understand that his what he did wasn't so different to what you plan to do. You've seen him from within the Akatsuki, and you might be the one most suited to understand him. You figured out why he did it, didn't you?"

"Yes. He did it because he loved you. Your Brother wanted you to be strong. So naturally, he caused you a great pain so that you would spend your entire life gaining the power necessary to defeat him."

(Both Pein and Sasuke were straight-faced and treating this discussion seriously. Konan, meanwhile, was having a hard time.)

"When he was in the Akatsuki, I couldn't tell why Itachi was there. It wasn't for the money or the excuse to commit violent acts while being protected from hunter-nin, like most of the others. Now I understand that he joined the Akatsuki for you."

"Yes, and it worked. I've been successful in killing Itachi and I am currently having a conversation with the most powerful ninja I know of instead of being killed by him. The pain I have lived has truly allowed me to become a powerful ninja. And it wasn't worth it."

Pein widened his eyes in surprise.

"It doesn't matter how powerful I am. Sure, I can make a change in the world I live in. But I don't want to save my village or to collect swords. All I want is my family back, and that's the only thing my power won't give me. I would become weak if it meant having my family back."

"The peace you plan to create will be just the same. It won't matter that a nation is at peace if it's because everyone is terrified of war and the other nations have been already destroyed. This kind of peace won't be any better then what you've lived through. There's something missing in your plan that makes the end result differ from true peace."

"However, I saw, during your invasion, something that might be closer than true peace. I saw the ninja of Konoha fighting not for themselves, but for their village. I saw Hinata risking her life for Naruto. I saw that it was only in that moment where her life was on the line that she could confess her love to him."

"I see it with the way I feel about Naruto. He had been assigned to me as a teammate back when I was a ninja of the leaf. At the time, I didn't care for him, but that changed once I fought alongside him. Something about fighting dangerous battles with him at my side changed our relationship and he became my best friend. "

"What are you trying to say?"

"If the elemental Nations fought side-to-side, they would no longer hate each other. Instead, they will create a bond that forms when people fight side-by-side. To do that, they need an enemy strong enough to force them to band together. An enemy who has already hurt them, and stolen their jinjuriki. The Akatsuki. I can join you in becoming the enemy that everyone will fight together, allowing for true peace and fellowship.

Pein stayed silent and thoughtful for a moment.

"Sounds like a plan."

Konan wanted to say something, but she was too dumbfounded by their sheer stupidity.