Chapter Two

Sunlight.

Streaming in his window.

Blinding.

Him.

Argh!

Naruto dived to the right and immediately fell to the floor and huddled with his blanket over his head. Who the hell had forgotten to shut the blinds when he went to sleep last night? Naruto weighed the options….

Damn, it was his own fault.

After a while he sighed and struggled his way out of the killer blanket that was attempting to take revenge for the night of restless sleep Naruto had put it through and then, hurling the offensive thing at his bed where it spitefully fell down the other side to lay between the bed and the wall, Naruto scrubbed at his face to wake up and began searching for clothing.

He managed to sleepily put his black mesh T-shirt on backwards only once before getting it on right, and paid slightly more attention to his pants when he put them on, getting it right the first time.

Stifling a yawn, Naruto cast another, annoyed, look back at his wilful blanket and then decided to leave it; may the stupid thing enjoy its day on the floor, he decided and wandered to the bathroom to wash his face.

A while later a still half sleepy Naruto sat at his kitchen table staring gloomily into his bowl of cereal. He had been hoping to sleep-in this morning, since he wasn't going to be training with Sasuke, but obviously the fates, the blinds in his room, his blanket and yes, even this cereal, were against him. Yawning, Naruto slurped the last mouthful of milk from the bottom of the bowl and then dumped the empty dish into the sink.

He supposed it didn't matter much that he couldn't sleep-in, he'd been having another bizarre dream about the nine-tails anyway so, frankly, he was happy to be awake; and he was meeting up with Konohamaru, Moegi and Udon that morning to celebrate the three graduating from the academy.

Naruto smirked as he grabbed his weapons from the table, put them on quickly and then scooped up his forehead protector and tied it on as he walked out his front door. If Konohamaru and his friends were anywhere as excited as he had been when he'd first graduated, then they'd probably already be up, alert and waiting for him, even though he hadn't said he'd show up for another hour or so yet.

Locking his door behind him, Naruto walked quickly through the streets of Konoha and to Konohamaru's chosen meeting place; his smirk only grew wider when he arrived to find all three twelve-year-olds ready and waiting, talking excitedly amongst themselves.

"Yo! Konohamaru!" Naruto waved a greeting to the boy and his friends as he approached and received an enthusiastic set of waves in return. "I thought you'd be here early," Naruto said as he reached them, putting his hands behind his head as he spoke.

"Couldn't sleep," Konohamaru answered, his eyes bright. "I just kept wondering what today was going to be like, and what our new Sensei would be like, and what our training would be like, and before I knew it the sun was coming up!"

Naruto laughed, "just make sure you don't go to sleep during your group assignments. What time do you have to be there anyway?"

When Naruto had graduated they'd had to be there early in the morning, Konohamaru and his friends had sounded like they'd have most of the morning to kill when he'd spoken to them briefly yesterday, though.

"An hour before noon," Moegi said and then turned to Konohamaru. "And don't forget," she said sternly.

"I won't," Konohamaru answered, pouting slightly. Obviously this was what they'd been talking about before Naruto had arrived.

"Why bother telling him that?" Naruto said lazily and leaned against a nearby tree, "you can just remind him at the proper time."

"Nope. Can't," she said and grimaced. "I have to help at home this morning, Udon is helping. We were just here until you showed up."

Naruto blinked, "you have to work on your graduation day? Ouch."

"Hmph," she made the sound of annoyance and then grabbed Udon by the back of his shirt and started dragging him away down the street. "I'll see you later, Naruto-niichan! Konohamaru-chan, don't be late!"

Konohamaru growled after her and Naruto quickly choked back a chuckle that would have earned him a glare just as fierce if Konohamaru noticed it.

"Stop laughing at me," Konohamaru said and turned his glare on Naruto. Naruto guessed he hadn't hidden his chuckle to well then.

"I'm not laughing at you," Naruto said and stood up straighter. "I'm laughing with you."

"I'm not laughing," the boy said, glaring harder.

Naruto waved a hand negligently, "details; come on, I'll buy you some ramen."

At the mention of ramen Konohamaru dropped his glare, "really? You'll really buy me ramen!?"

It was Naruto's turn to glare. "Don't say it like it never happens," he grouched. "Only one bowl though, I can't afford more."

Konohamaru turned a blazing grin on Naruto and then the two of them wandered off in search of Naruto's favourite ramen place.

The morning went by quickly and it wasn't long before Naruto was waving goodbye to Konohamaru as the boy raced to the academy; late, despite how much he'd protested earlier that he wouldn't be.

Standing in the centre of the road after Konohamaru had disappeared from sight, Naruto scratched the back of his head and tried to decide what to do next. After a while, and a few curses from the people he was getting in the way of, Naruto began to walk randomly, still deep in contemplative thought.

Since he'd missed morning training, he should probably go train…but that was boring on his own, so really he should go and see if he could find Sasuke.

But on the other hand, Sasuke had already done all his training for the morning and would probably be doing something he couldn't do with Naruto around like he normally was, so it'd be rude for Naruto to interrupt him…. Not that Naruto cared if he were being rude to that bastard or not, but he supposed he should let Sasuke have at least one Naruto free day. At the thought his eyes flickered briefly, if anyone had been watching him they probably wouldn't even have noticed the expression as he covered it up almost immediately. Naruto had other reasons not to go seeking out Sasuke at the first opportunity.

The other day he'd gotten a taste of what it would be like to lose someone so close to him…. He didn't want to ever feel that again. Just because Sasuke was acting like everything was fine between them, as if being the Kyubi and messing up his chance to defeat Itachi wasn't that big a deal. Naruto knew Sasuke. He'd had years to figure out the way Sasuke thought and, while what the dark-haired boy had said might have been true, it didn't change the fact that over the last day or two, when Sasuke hadn't thought Naruto was watching, the blond had seen this expression in the other boys' eyes. It was a dark look, that made Naruto shiver to think about it, and while Naruto wasn't exactly sure what was going on in Sasuke's head when his eyes looked like that…he didn't think he wanted to find out. And he didn't want to lose his friend; his best friend.

His restless sleep the night before had been caused by just this subject and Naruto's mind slowly wandered back to the last coherent thought he'd had before exhaustion and weird dreams had swallowed him.

He had to separate himself from Sasuke.

It had hurt so much when he'd thought the dark-haired boy had hated him; it had hurt so much it had bordered on physical pain. He didn't want to feel like that again. Sure, for now Sasuke was still around, the danger of that situation had been averted; but what about next time? And he knew there'd be a next time. His friendship with Sasuke was precious, and hard-won; but it was also hard to hold on to. They never mentioned it but their friendship was something of a tightrope act between true friendship and complete rivalry, and who knew when one of them would slip? Before now it hadn't even occurred to Naruto that one of them would, but now…. He wouldn't be able to bare it.

So his only choice was to separate himself from the other boy. He wouldn't be able to do it fast; Sasuke wasn't stupid, he'd figure out fairly quickly that something was up if Naruto suddenly started avoiding him.

Lost deeply in his thoughts, it took Naruto a few moments to realise that he could hear the voice of the person he was thinking about and he looked up in surprise, spotting the back of Sasuke's head immediately. The black-haired boy was talking to Sakura, who was obviously on her lunch break, and Naruto bit his lower lip lightly.

Well it was now or never; time to begin the process of separation.

Pretending like he hadn't even seen them, Naruto changed the direction of his steps, aiming to walk passed them on the other side of the road while apparently staring off into space. If he didn't do anything flamboyant or Naruto-ish, they wouldn't even notice him.

Or at least he'd thought so.

Letting his feet carry him as far away from the two as possible, Naruto caught the tail end of their conversation.

"…o why don't we go out to lunch?" Sakura was saying as Naruto got within hearing range and he flinched.

"…No," Sasuke replied, typically. "I'm busy."

"Doing what? Do you need help? I can use my lunch break to help you out."

"Hn."

It was at that moment that Naruto realised he'd been caught. All his ninja instincts screamed at him as he suddenly felt eyes burning into the back of his head and a moment later he realised he had ground to a halt and begun to turn around; such was the pull of an Uchiha's desperate glare.

"I don't need help. I'm going to be training with Naruto," Sasuke lied to Sakura calmly, and walked passed her and to join Naruto on the other side of the street. As he approached, Sasuke's eyes bored into Naruto's in such a way that threatened great bodily harm if Naruto didn't play along.

Naruto swallowed nervously and then did the only thing he could do; he played along.

"There you are, bastard! I've been looking all over," he could feel Sakura's glare on him. Damn, he was so going to be in trouble now.

"Hn," Sasuke replied; his glare relaxing slightly as he realised his escape was assured. "Follow me."

Naruto glared at Sasuke's quickly retreating back and then turned to wave goodbye to Sakura and was promptly snubbed.

Damn. Another black mark against him in Sakura's book; once again because of Sasuke. Damn that guy was lucky Naruto considered him a friend or Naruto would be seriously pissed at him right now.

"…Thanks."

Naruto looked up, startled at the sound of Sasuke's low statement.

"What?" Play dumb, maybe I didn't hear right.

"I said 'thanks'," Sasuke repeatedly irritably and Naruto blinked at him.

Sasuke glared back, "stop that."

"But…"

Sasuke's glare grew fiercer, "shut up and walk faster."

Naruto blinked again and then glared and hurried to catch up with Sasuke, who had increased his pace.

"I thought making me follow you was a trick to get Sakura to leave you alone, why the hell should I keep following you?" he demanded.

Sasuke smirked and looked at Naruto over his shoulder, "if you don't want to follow me then why are you?"

"Because you said to and I want to know why!"

"Hn."

Was it just him or did that sound more like a half swallowed sound of amusement instead of the dismissive sound it was supposed to be passed off as?

"Well?!"

"I'm going to study my scrolls again. I thought you'd want to continue where you left off yesterday."

Naruto's expression changed instantly and he raced ahead of Sasuke so he could look at him properly, "really?"

"Yes."

"Absolutely!" Damn you. How can I avoid you if you're giving me reasons to hang around?! "The one on fire jutsu I was reading yesterday was really interesting. Though I still can't figure out how you were able to use some of them when we were only twelve."

"Fire element jutsu are a speciality of the Uchiha family," Sasuke replied and Naruto glared at him.

"Could your family do everything or something?" he grouched.

Sasuke smirked, "pretty much."

"Stop being such an arrogant bastard!" Naruto exclaimed and turned away from Sasuke, crossing his arms over his chest. Arrogant son-of-a-…. As Naruto stomped off down the road, determined not to talk to Sasuke any more that day unless he absolutely had to, he could have sworn he heard Sasuke choke back another laugh.

Smoke. Again.

Naruto did his best not to inhale as the strong scents of smoke, ash, burning wood, burning flesh and blood assaulted him; oh Kami he hated this.

His breathing was shallow to avoid the smells and smoke around him and when he finally got a little used to it and looked around him, he wished he hadn't. Around him pieces of people, or things that might once have been people, littered the ground. Around his feet the hard, half burnt earth was stained dark with the letting of blood and it clung to him along with the scent of death as he moved.

Picking his steps carefully, Naruto tried not to accidentally step on what might have once been someone he knew and steeled himself, holding back his grief, and his anger. He had to be calm now, he couldn't let his emotions run away from him; and he couldn't look away. He wanted to; he desperately wanted to look away from the visions of destruction that littered his path, but he couldn't, and he wouldn't. He owed it to them, the people that had risked and lost their lives in this seemingly hopeless fight. He would avenge them; or die trying.

He took a step forward and the world seemed to melt and shift around him. He looked up and into dark, fire wreathed eyes that seemed to bore into his soul and strip it bare, leaving him raw and shivering.

Fear consumed him in that moment as he stared into those eyes; the power, the malice behind them was too much; it was over whelming. He had to run away, he had to flee or he, too, would be slaughtered like all those that lay around him.

As Naruto stared in terror up into those eyes, the creature, the Kyubi,bent slightly and brought his face down to peer at the tiny thing before him and its lips pulled back into a snarl revealing sharp canines stained with the blood of the dead that littered the ground. Slowly it let out a breath and Naruto's shirt flapped around his arms as hot, death laden air whirled passed him. Naruto was frozen in place, still in the grip of his fear as those teeth came towards him, parting as they came closer.

"Aaahhhhhhhhhh!"

"Naruto! Snap out of it!"

Naruto's eyes went wide in shock as his head snapped to the side and sharp pain throbbed through the left side of his face. Breathing heavily, he slowly lifted his hand and tentatively touched his cheek, which was now hot and throbbing.

"Naruto?"

Someone had hit him.

"Naruto."

Slowly, Naruto turned his head and stared blankly at Sasuke.

"Idiot, what the hell is your problem, I said snap out of it. I'll hit you again," the black-haired boy warned.

Naruto blinked and then focused on Sasuke. He looked worried.

"What are you…?" Naruto began and then amended his question as he finally took in his surroundings and realised he was in Sasuke's room, "why am I here?"

The worried expression melted off Sasuke's face immediately and he sat back and glared at Naruto with irritation, "you fell asleep on the floor and I couldn't wake you, so I brought you in here to get you out of the way."

"Oh…" Naruto rubbed at his sore cheek. The lights were on and Naruto could see through a gap in the curtains that it was pitch black outside. How long had he slept? "Why did you hit me?" he asked grouchily.

Sasuke's lips tightened.

"You were having a nightmare and weren't waking up." And I scared you, Naruto added mentally as he again took in the barely perceptible expression on Sasuke's face.

"You didn't have to hit me," Naruto pouted and rubbed his cheek again for emphasis.

"Fine. Next time you can keep sleeping."

An expression of terror flitted over Naruto's face before he could hide it and Sasuke's intense glare lightened slightly.

"Baka. Are you all right?"

"Of course!" Naruto said, a little to quickly, and he finally sat up straight in the bed and glared, "except for the massive bruise I'm going to have now."

"Hn," Sasuke said, obviously unconvinced; but he stood up anyway, allowing Naruto to climb out of the bed, "like it'll last long."

Naruto flinched slightly at the roundabout mention of the Nine-tails but once again covered it up by grinning and poking his tongue out at the other boy. "You're just jealous," he taunted.

"Hn," again Sasuke was clearly unconvinced.

"Man! I'm so hungry! Don't suppose you have any food, do you?" Naruto asked as cheerfully as he could and stretched to get the kinks out of his back.

"I made dinner," Sasuke said, giving Naruto another look over before leading the way from the bedroom and to the other end of the house, and to the kitchen.

"Really? What did you make?" Naruto put a bounce in his step and followed along behind Sasuke who didn't bother to answer the question. "Mmmm, I can smell it." Rice and fish; basic food but more than his normal meal of ramen.

"Stop smelling it and eat it, dobe." Sasuke said and sat down at the low table and picked up his chopsticks.

"Don't call me that, bastard." Naruto said and sunk down beside him, picking up his own chopsticks.

"Hn."

Naruto finished his first mouthful and glared, "can't you say anything other than that?"

"Hn," Sasuke ignored Naruto's protest and carried on eating.

"Bastard," Naruto threw some rice at him.

Slowly, Sasuke stopped eating and turned to look first at the grains of rice sitting innocently on his arm and shoulder, and then switched his gaze to Naruto. Naruto smirked and looked at a boring painting on the wall of some forest scenery. He could positively feel the hot glare that was burning into the back of his head, but he ignored it completely and carried on eating. The food was kind of good, who would've thought.

They ate the rest of their meal in silence and Naruto's thoughts drifted back to the dream he'd had. How embarrassing, really, to have had a nightmare, not just in Sasuke's house, but where Sasuke could see him. He wondered briefly if he'd said anything out loud as he'd struggled in the grips of his dream.

The dream had been almost identical to the one he'd had the night before. Carefully he suppressed a shudder as he remembered the feeling of fear and helplessness that had come over him seeing the Nine-tails so close to him. Somehow, he could still feel the hot breath of the creature burning over his skin and permeating his clothing with its stench. It didn't feel like that when he spoke with the Nine-tails in his mind. The Kyubi was evil, he knew that; it delighted in death, destruction and the feel of pure power running through its veins…but somehow he'd never felt real fear of the creature that lived within him. But in the dream he'd known fear; worse than that, he'd known true terror.

What the hell did it mean?! Were his dreams the Kyubi's way of attempting to intimidate him? Or was it his own fears manifesting themselves into a form he could recognise while sleeping? Maybe it was a mix of both?

"Oi, dobe. Hurry up and finish, I want to do the dishes."

"Huh?" Naruto's eyes refocused and he turned an uncomprehending stare on Sasuke.

"Eat. Now," Sasuke said shortly and Naruto stared down at the half bowl of rice in his hands.

"Oh, right," bending his mind to his task Naruto avoided Sasuke's piercing look and finished the last of his dinner in record time. "There, all done," he presented the dirty dishes to Sasuke with a grin and the other boy took them.

"Good, now come help me."

"What? Why do I have to help?" Naruto protested as Sasuke walked across the room and dumped the dishes in the sink.

"You used them, you can help clean them," Sasuke replied.

Grumbling, Naruto levered himself off of the floor and slouched after the other boy. He hated doing dishes. Luckily there weren't many of them and they finished in only a few minutes.

"What time is it?" Naruto asked and leaned back against the counter, watching Sasuke as he put the newly washed and dried dishes away.

"Late," Sasuke replied, helpfully. "You can use the guest room down the hall from mine; there's no point wandering around outside now."

Naruto skilfully hid a twitch. Damn it. The plan was to separate myself from Sasuke, this is not separation.

"No, it's okay, I don't mind…"

"Don't argue, dobe," Sasuke didn't even bother to look at him, simply walked out of the room.

This time Naruto did twitch. Stubborn bastard. Naruto followed him.

"I'm a big boy now, you know. I can get home safely, even if it is a little dark out," leading the way down the hall, Sasuke walked into the lounge where he carefully sat down on a mound of cushions, mindful of his ribs, and picked up one of the scrolls he'd been studying.

"What's the point?" Sasuke answered, infuriatingly logical, "you'll end up here tomorrow morning anyway."

"Yeah, but…"

Sasuke finally looked over at him, his expression irritated, "but?"

Naruto glared and flopped down onto the floor and grabbed the scroll he'd gone to sleep over earlier, "oh fine. I don't care."

"Oi, Ero-Sensei." Naruto waited but got no response.

"O~i, Ero-Sensei!" Still no response. He sighed.

"Jiraiya-Sensei."

The man looked up from his scroll and looked at Naruto as if he'd only just heard him.

"Oh, I didn't see you there, brat. What do you want?"

Naruto glared at him, then grinned. "Teach me something interesting today."

The white haired man smiled slightly and then began to look thoughtful, "Hmmm…No, you know that already. Hn…No, that's too much for you. How about… Oh, no; you'd just mess that up…"

Naruto glared at the white-haired man who finally turned and rubbed the top of his head, messing up his hair and making his forehead protector slip down over one eye.

"Okay! I'll teach you my most secret, specialized, and perfect technique!"

"No." Naruto pushed his protector back into place and pushed his fringe back into place, "Teach me a realJustu, I have no use to learn to peep."

The man deflated slightly, "Well if you're going to be that way about it, I won't everoffer to teach it to you again!"

Naruto's expression went flat, "I don't want too. Teach me something good."

"Hmph, fine. How about…"

Naruto blinked his eyes open and yawned. Mmmm…. Good, no blinding sunlight this morning.

Stretching, Naruto's arm smacked into a wall at his right, where there shouldn't be a wall, and he instantly sat up. Where the hell…? Oh right, he was at Sasuke's. He fell back against his pillow and snuggled down under the blankets. Mmmm…toasty warm.

He managed to lie still for a full minute before he sighed and sat up again. It was really hard to concentrate on sleeping in when the idea of Sasuke slamming the door open and kicking him out of bed was a viable possibility. Besides, the sun was already up so it was only a matter of time; he may as well get up now and save himself the fight that would ensue.

Yawning again, Naruto rolled out of bed and quickly pulled his clothes on, eyeing the door the entire time. It hadn't been flung open yet, it was making him a little paranoid.

Stretching after he'd pulled his clothes on, Naruto decided to obey the call of his empty stomach and went in search of food, or Sasuke. Both really.

He found Sasuke first.

Walking down the hallway, he glanced through Sasuke's open bedroom door as he passed it and saw the black-haired boy sitting, half dressed, outside on his room's small balcony. He deviated his steps to take him there instead, keeping quiet as it became apparent that the boy was meditating, or something.

It took a full five minutes of watching before Naruto realised that Sasuke was doing something other than simply staring at the inside of his eyelids. When Naruto had walked out there, Sasuke's breathing had been short, taking the stress away from his ribs, but now he was taking more natural breaths; and he was sitting up straighter, his figure no longer slightly hunched over as he attempted to pretend that his sides weren't the mother of all that was painful. Naruto lifted an eyebrow and looked down at the two scrolls sitting by Sasuke's side. So that's what he'd been studying so intensely the last couple of days; healing jutsu.

"What do you want, dobe?"

Naruto started out of his observation to find Sasuke glaring up at him.

"I'm hungry."

Sasuke's expression took on that slight twitch he got whenever Naruto said or did something that made the black-haired boy want to grab the blond and shake him. Hard.

"You know where the kitchen is," Sasuke gathered his scrolls and stood up easily; kicking the cushion he'd been sitting on back into his room and following it to grab his shirt off of the end of his bed.

Naruto shrugged, "I don't like messing around in other peoples kitchens."

"Baka," Sasuke threw the scrolls onto the bed and then pulled his shirt on, flicking the buttons shut as he used his foot to kick the balcony's sliding door closed after Naruto had followed him inside.

"Do you have any cup ramen?" Naruto asked and received a steely glare.

"Not in my house."

Naruto frowned, "how can you live without ramen?"

"Healthily," Sasuke said and pointedly pushed Naruto out into the hallway, and followed. "After we eat we're going to train," he said, and tied on his forehead protector, "real training this time."

Naruto nodded. After he had figured out what Sasuke was doing it was fairly obvious that Sasuke would want to get back to real training.

"So you completely healed your ribs?" Naruto asked and peered at Sasuke's midsection as if he could somehow look passed the fabric, skin and muscle to inspect the ribs himself.

"Yes," Sasuke said shortly, "completely."

Sasuke had gone insane.

Yes, that was totally what had happened, it had to be; normal, sane Sasuke wouldn't be attacking him with, as far as Naruto could tell, full intent to kill, so that only left the insane option.

I knew he was still mad at me!

Naruto dodged a row of Kunai that lodged themselves, one after another, into the tree he'd been hiding behind and then jumped, leaping to the highest branch he could get to before leaping to the next tree along the line. Where the hell was that bastard anyway? Sasuke had always been better at stealth than Naruto and he was now using that knowledge to the limit. Damn him.

Behind! Naruto focused chakra to his feet and dropped himself from his tree limb, gripping onto the bottom of it and throwing a handful of shuriken at Sasuke who had appeared a second after Naruto had moved.

Sasuke easily moved out of the way of the shuriken and landed on the same branch as Naruto, looking down at him with an irritated expression on his face.

"Fight seriously, dobe."

Naruto glared up at Sasuke and pointed and accusing finger at him, "you're trying to kill me!"

"Chi'." Sasuke crossed his arms over his chest, "I'm trying to train seriously."

"So that's your plan?! You're going to kill me 'by accident' while we're training so you don't get into trouble!" Naruto exclaimed and let go of the chakra in his feet, twisting in mid-air so he landed on his feet.

He glared up at Sasuke, "I knew you were still mad at me for the entire Itachi thing!"

Sasuke's expression went flat and he jumped down out of the tree, landing lightly in a crouch and looked up at Naruto, his eyes dark.

Naruto twitched nervously at the look in Sasuke's eyes and couldn't help taking a half step backwards as the silence began to stretch. This wasn't good.

"Fight me," Sasuke said suddenly, "seriously."

"Wh-what? What do you mean seriously, I always fight you seriously," Naruto had meant for the words to come out as an exclamation, instead they sounded like a weak protest.

Sasuke's eyes narrowed, "you've never once fought me seriously."

"I hav-"

Sasuke cut him off before he could even begin to protest, uncoiling from his crouch and pushing Naruto back against a tree, his arms on either side of Naruto's head. His eyes were glittering and Naruto could see a faint tinge of red in them.

"You have power, that power that Itachi wants; the Nine-tails. You have that, I've seen you use it, even though I didn't know what it was. You've never fought me seriously. Fight me seriously."

"I…" Naruto's eyes were wide. The Nine-tails? Fight him with the power of the Kyubi? Sasuke couldn't be serious, no way. Sasuke wouldn't even stand a chance if Naruto did that and…and Naruto didn't want to beat him like that. Sasuke was a fight he wanted to conquer with his own power, not with the borrowed power of the Kyubi.

Naruto suddenly found his voice and shoved Sasuke away from him, "no! Absolutely not! Just because you know about it doesn't mean I have to do what you say! I won't do it!"

Sasuke reacted quickly, grabbing Naruto by his wrists and slamming him back against the tree, "you have to!" he snapped and Naruto growled at him.

"I don't have to do anything. Let me the hell go!"

Sasuke set his jaw and glared at Naruto darkly, "no. Not until you agree."

"Never!" Naruto did his best to try and wrench his wrists out of Sasuke's grip but succeeded only in making them ache. Damn him! This was why Sasuke hadn't gotten mad at him, and why he hadn't minded hanging around with him the last few days. He wanted to use him for the Kyubi! Damn you, you power hungry jerk! "Let me go! I won't fight you!" And he lashed out with his foot catching Sasuke in the side, making him release his grip and stagger a few steps away.

Naruto rubbed at his wrists and glared at Sasuke as he pulled himself back up straight.

"Naruto," Sasuke growled. Naruto cut him off.

"I won't let you use me for whatever twisted plan you came up with! I won't fight you with the Kyubi's power so you can just stop your friendly act and fuck off!" Then he turned to leave.

And Sasuke caught his hand, yanking him back, "Naruto!"

Naruto glared fixedly at the ground and kept his voice calm. "Let. Me. Go. Now."

"No." Sasuke's tightened his grip, "Naruto, you have to help me. You have to fight me seriously."

"Why the hell should I?"

"Because…," Sasuke's fingers flexed around Naruto's wrist. "Because I still couldn't beat him," he said and pulled Naruto further towards him, his voice sounding desperate. "I could fight him, but I couldn't beat him. It was pure luck that I almost killed him and I'm not stupid enough to think otherwise. I have to train. I have to train and become stronger but not just stronger, I have to become stronger than him. That power you have inside you, he wants that and if he wants it then it's power that he doesn't have. If you train against me using that power, then I can learn to match it! I'll get stronger.

It was the pleading sound in Sasuke's voice that made Naruto finally look up from the ground and at the black-haired boy, and it was the desperate look on his face that made him suck his bottom lip into his mouth and begin to worry at it.

Sasuke never asked for help; but he'd just done so…and Sasuke would never lie about something like this. Did that mean what he was saying was true?

"I don't want to fight you like that," Naruto said quietly. "That power, it's not mine, it's not me. I want to fight you with my power."

Sasuke's dark eyes kept Naruto's gaze for a moment and then suddenly slipped away to stare at the ground as he released Naruto's hand.

"I understand," he shoved his hands in his pockets and his jaw set. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked."

And suddenly Naruto felt like he was the one acting like a bastard. Sasuke's expression had gone flat again and he refused to look up so Naruto could see his eyes. Damn you, you son-of-a-bitch!

"Fine," Naruto said. He didn't want to do it but…how could he not? "I'll fight you."

Sasuke's eyes snapped back to Naruto in shock, "what?"

"I said I'd fight you! Just like you want, with the Kyubi's power."

Sasuke stayed silent for a moment his expression completely unreadable as he thought and then his eyes narrowed, "no."

Naruto gaped at him. "What?" the word was shrill and indignant.

Sasuke closed his eyes, taking a deep breath, and then opened them again, "No. I shouldn't have asked you. I don't want you thinking I'm using you for your power, I'll think of another way to train."

Another way to train…? What the hell was Sasuke on? First he wants to fight the Kyubi's power and now he was protesting over Naruto agreeing?! "You slam me against a tree, demand I help you and then you say 'no' when I agree?!" Naruto clutched his hands into fists and then pointed at finger at Sasuke, "what the hell is your plan?!"

Sasuke stared at him, eyes a little wide and his jaw set as if he were having an internal debate with himself.

"I want your help," he finally said and then paused before going on, his voice firmer, "but I won't risk our friendship to get it."

"Won't risk…" Naruto repeated dumbly. Did Sasuke just admit, out loud that they were friends?

"Forget this happened," Sasuke ordered, and began to walk away.

Naruto snapped his mouth shut from when it had fallen open in shock and ran after him, catching his arm.

"Don't order me around! What the hell is going on in your head, Sasuke? If you didn't want to risk our…our friendship then you shouldn't have tried to make me fight you in the first place."

Sasuke stared at Naruto's hand on his arm for a long moment and then growled in annoyance, "I wasn't thinking about our damned friendship!" he snapped. "Ever since we got back I've been thinking about Itachi! I have to defeat him. I can't let him stay out there, doing whatever he wants, hurting whoever he likes. All I've been thinking about is training! And then it occurred to me that you could help. That's all I was thinking about!"

"Fine, so I agreed to what you wanted. Why the hell did you change your mind?"

Sasuke glared and smacked Naruto's hand from his arm, turned and once again started walking away, "I just did. Be thankful."

Naruto ground his teeth together, "that's not an answer, Sasuke!"

Sasuke paused, his body tense, and then he carried on walking, disappearing from Naruto's sight in seconds. This time Naruto didn't go after him, though. He didn't go after him because regardless of if he was meant to or not, he'd heard what Sasuke had muttered when he'd paused. The four softly spoken words rooted Naruto's feet in place and left him unable to feel anything but shock.

Four pain-filled words.

"I almost lost you."