A/N: Bahhh =] I know what yer all thinking :P Here comes the author with very bad action scenes :D and I can't really blame you for that XP But anywhos, I noticed the large amount of reviews I got, even after that chapter that was fully constructed of my bad action scenes! –has a heart attack- YOU'RE ALL WOOOOONDERFUL REVIEWERS AND REVIEWERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Disclaimer: -Sigh- I've gone for psychiatric help, and I'm slowly learning to face it: I don't own Naruto. HAPPY NOW!? –sobs uncontrollably and goes into hysterics-
Warning: Yaoi and potty-mouth swearing =] Evacuate now if you gots problems ;/
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"..." normal speech
'...' thoughts
Dobe = dead last
Baka = idiot
Futon = Japanese bed made of straw
Ohayo = Good Morning (said before 10 AM)
Nani = What
Sensei = Teacher
Shinobi – Ninja (I think...anyone wanna correct me on that? :P)
Bolded text – setting
Italics – emphasized thoughts or words, can also be flashbacks
Italics: underlined – emphasized thoughts or words underlined for added emphasis
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Chapter 7 – Never was and Never will be
Konoha – Gaara's Apartment, street
Gaara considered sending sand to finish them both off, but something about his veiled sensei held a sense of control over him. Maybe it was the sand Jounin's ability to make eye contact longer than the others. He had control over him, even if was only very little, and that was what landed Baki as the teacher of Gaara in the first place. Baki's regal exterior always seemed to be challenging Gaara to show any signs of weakness. If Gaara did, he lost.
And this is how Baki had found him: stuck in the ground at a Leaf Jounin's mercy.
As the sand Genin brooded about his sensei, he had missed the words that were currently being exchanged between the two Jounins standing behind him.
"Tell your students to withdrawl, and we may let you go without any charges," Kakashi was saying.
"Temari! Kankuro!" Baki yelled loudly with the solid tone of a command. Both siblings looked up from their losing battle, shocked that their sensei had appeared. The Chuunins ceased their attacks immediately as well, but both parties kept a wary on each other.
"Now, that wasn't so hard was it?" Kakashi said light heartedly. But the tense atmosphere was far from lifted. Baki only continued to wear a bitter expression.
Silence enveloped the shinobis in the area. Both parties didn't know what to say to each other.
Temari shot her sensei a questioning look, her eyes asking what her sensei's motives were in Konoha. But Baki only shook his head slightly in return.
Kakashi looked around the small street. Finally, he asked, "Where's Naruto?"
Everyone – or at least, the Leaf shinobis – looked up at the question. Temari, seeing as none of her siblings were really enthusiastic to give an answer, nervously replied, "He's probably back in the apartment,"
'It is taking Iruka an unusually long time to get him out...maybe he left already,' he thought.
With a nod, Kakashi decided to go in himself, while the 3 remaining Chuunins stayed outside, exchanging heated looks with the intruders from the Sand.
Konoha – Gaara's Apartment, Temari's bedroom
Tut, tut, tut...BANG!
Tut, tut, tut...BANG!
The sounds persisted for a good 2 minutes. Naruto could only assume that it was the man's footsteps and slamming of doors he heard. But to Naruto's horror, the sounds grew steadily louder as the man inched nearer and nearer.
'It won't be long now...'
As if on cue, the door of Temari's room was slid open quite violently, making the floor shake a little.
Naruto's trembling increased tenfold as he heard the man slowly walk into the room; it was as if he was suspicious of his presence inside.
Naruto clamped his hands more tightly onto his mouth. The man stopped his footsteps. The suspense was eating up the blonde from the inside.
Seconds sluggishly came and went. Naruto's shallow and quiet breaths slowly became louder as the seconds passed.
Finally, when Naruto knew that his breaths couldn't get any louder, he realized that he needed air. The thick, distinct fragrance of Temari's clothes in the closet was slowly suffocating him. He needed fresh air, and fast.
One of his hands left his mouth and slowly inched towards the door's handle, shaking in midair all the way. When his fingers delicately grasped it, he pushed it as slowly as he could, hoping against hope that it wouldn't creak. When he was done sliding it open as much as he dared, he felt the slightest current of air seep through.
Through the opening created a sliver of light that illuminated the man standing in the middle of the room, his back turned towards Naruto.
The man looked around for a second longer before rummaging through Temari's belongings. He flipped over some clothes, looked under the blanket, went under the desk, and finally, when nothing else was left, he turned towards the closet with a terrified Naruto stuffed inside.
The man walked towards the closet as everything went by in slow-mo. When his hand grasped the handle, however, a second set of footsteps arrived in the room.
"Kakashi!" the man said, shocked.
"Have you found him yet?" a different voice asked.
'Great, as if my luck couldn't get any worse,' Naruto thought bitterly. He knew he had no choice but to fight his way out, but now that there were two of them, it was going to be considerably harder to make his daring escape.
"No, actually, I was just going to check the-" his pursuer said as he slid open the door to find a Naruto staring back at him.
The two men stared at Naruto for a second, stunned. During that time, Naruto leapt from his position and made a lunge for the door, only to be caught around the waist by a strong set of arms.
The first thing that came to Naruto's mind was to move every single part of his body to escape. But he couldn't free himself, no matter how hard he tried.
"Naruto! It's me! What's wrong with you?" the newcomer said as he struggled to keep a hold on the squirming blonde.
Naruto managed to free his arms and was going to swat the man upside the head, but his pursuer appeared in front of him and took hold as well. Naruto noticed that one of his hands were bloody where his fangs had pierced them.
"Naruto, it's okay!" the man with deep brown hair explained loudly as Naruto began desperately trying to kick him.
Knowing that his current effort wasn't going to get him anywhere, Naruto started thrashing even more. As Naruto attempted to bite the man again, he was flung onto the floor and pinned there.
The impact knocked the wind out of the blonde, and before he could react, a sharp pain erupted from the back of his neck before a curtain of black was pulled shut over his vision, signalling the end of his grand performance.
"Kakashi! What are you doing!? You just hit Naruto!" an infuriated voice rang in Naruto's ears before his hearing ebbed away. Naruto's eyelids shut at the sight of a pair of feet before trying a final desperate attempt to escape...
'Gaara...help...'
But all had already faded to black.
Konoha – Hospital
The world swirled around him. A slight, tickling sensation met his face. He felt warm, but his head throbbed in numb pain.
"Naruto?" a voice echoed in the distance. The blonde felt something squeeze harder on his left arm, striking a couple of pain nerves as it did so. "Naruto?"
Naruto opened one of his eyes cautiously, and met a pair of onyx pools. He stared at them, his mind blank and wiped clean.
"Naruto!" the boy looming over him exclaimed as he immediately wrapped his arms around him possessively.
"Dobe, always getting into trouble..." the boy chided as he continued to hug the blonde tightly.
"Couldn't get out of there on your own, could you? You always needed someone to rescue you," the boy with pale skin continued as his grip grew tighter and tighter, as if Naruto was going to dissipate if he didn't hold tightly enough.
Then, everything struck the blonde like a punch in the face as Naruto's mind revived everything that had happened before...
A cup with water and a soapy toothbrush, an intense face with a pair of chiselled icy green eyes, a girl screaming, the feeling of suffocation, two men holding him down, and then darkness.
Naruto eyes grew wide before he pushed the boy off of him with all the strength he had left and leapt onto the floor before making a dash for the door.
But, to Naruto's great dismay, his aching legs gave away from under him and he tripped on his own feet.
Sasuke, needless to say, was utterly shocked. Naruto had pushed him so hard he landed across the room, only to witness the blonde clumsily trip. He wasn't really sure if Naruto intended to push him that hard. Didn't he know his own strength?
'And those eyes...it's those eyes again...' Sasuke thought, mortified at the memory of Naruto's frightened face when he saw him before he was knocked out cold.
Naruto, on the other hand, didn't waste any time getting back on his feet before pelting towards the door again, still clad in his black shorts and white t-shirt. Sasuke got up in turn and dashed after him as Naruto disappeared around the corner.
When Sasuke looked down the hallway, he found Naruto caught firmly in Tsunade's grasp. Naruto was squirming helplessly against her hold, apparently making no progress.
Tsunade walked inside the room and calmly put Naruto on his hospital bed again.
"Close the door, Sasuke," Tsunade said as he watched Naruto glare at her when he was set down.
'I'm never going to get out like this...' Naruto thought as he stayed still and glared at the woman across from him with all the hatred and determination he had left.
When the boy closed the door, the woman continued to gaze intently at Naruto, who glared daggers at her in reply.
With a sigh, Tsunade asked, "Do you remember anything?"
Naruto stopped glaring, surprised at her awkward question. He muttered, "You attacked Gaara and then you-"
"I'm not talking about that. Do you remember anything else? What's my name?" she asked intensely. Naruto was starting to get very uncomfortable.
'What's she talking about? She's not making any sense.' Naruto thought cynically.
"I don't know your name, I've never met you before," the blonde spat in reply, hatred coating every word he said. He gave them a look of purest loathing.
Sasuke felt his body go cold.
'He doesn't remember Tsunade?'
There was something wrong with Naruto...seriously wrong. He had heard Kakashi's report on his mission not too long ago. Naruto had acted strangely; he fought back very violently against him, like he was considered the enemy. He even bit Iruka at one point. It was as if the Naruto sitting in front of him, confused and angry, wasn't the Naruto he knew at all. They had only managed to bring back a fraud that only had Naruto's appearance.
Tsunade seemed to be thinking along the same lines, as she gave a resigned sigh.
"Tsunade-sama, what's wrong with him?" Sasuke asked. He felt a mixture of anger and fear as he awaited her answer. But Tsunade didn't reply. She only continued to scrutinize Naruto even more.
"Who is he? What's his name?" Tsunade asked as she pointed towards Sasuke, standing behind her, livid and afraid for Naruto's sanity.
"I don't know!" Naruto yelled furiously. All of this interrogation was striking some nerves in his mind. They were merely playing with his mind! He just wanted to go back to Gaara, and resume his short-lived life there.
"You should know," was the Hokage's short answer, "He's your boyfriend, Naruto. His name is Uchiha Sasuke."
"No, he can't be...Gaara's my boyfriend!" Naruto yelled, frustrated. But this time, his words didn't hold the same confidence as it did before.
"No, he isn't Naruto. Sasuke is," Tsunade explained as gently as she should.
'It hurts so much to see him like this...'
After a moment of silence as Naruto gazed at her, he stammered quietly, "Lies..."
Sasuke felt the overpowering urge to grab Naruto by the shoulders and shake him until he stopped whatever he was doing to him. What was Naruto talking about? Of course he knows him!
'Dobe! Can't you remember!?' he screamed with every essence of his being in his mind. But his mouth wouldn't move. The words remained caged inside, safe from the deathly, quiet atmosphere of the hospital room.
Tsunade shook her head sadly. She looked at Naruto with a heartbroken expression, sending a twinge of sympathy to strike Naruto's heart.
"You've lost your memory, Naruto. Gaara's been lying to you," Tsunade explained quietly as she reached for his hand.
Naruto swapped it away like it was an annoying fly.
"LIES!" he cried before Sasuke appeared out of nowhere and grabbed a hold of his shoulders, his eyes awash with the shiny lustre of tears and the burning fire of hate and desperation.
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A/N: Hello, hello! I've seen you've made it to the end of this short chapter! I hoped I managed to get a few angst moments in the hospital scene –is momentarily reminded of hospital scenes in soap operas- Anywhos, speaking of soap operas, I hope I didn't make Naruto too...how you say, girly? :P let me know if you've got any problems with how I portrayed the characters in this chapter! Oh, and I've decided to do a little bit of format-changing! I was typing this chappie up one fine morning when I realized that everything seemed a bit cramped and kinda all stuck together when they should be divided! Anywhos, I hope it didn't cause any confusion, even though I don't think it will =] Lemme know if you gots problems, m'kay? Thankies!
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Review Responses:
kashisenshey: hehe, yep, poor Konoha =] getting ripped apart by giant Godzilla snakes from Orochimaru an' all :/ But Konoha already has a world of pain, since Sasuke's in it XP I'll stop making fun of him now :P You know, I've always thought Gaara had a panda in him, since he looks like one =] But he doesn't ;/ Nope, he only has an animal who likes eating garbage in him o.O Poor guy XP I wish I could summon nin-chicks :( The only thing I can summon is teddy bears from my room ;/ ayame0: WAH! FANKIES!!! XD Hopefully I bringing the pace up a bit here =] Welps, here's the update! Not as long as I thought it would be, but I'm currently very desperate for a bit of brunch :P
Kamikakushi: Heh :P Don't worry about not being poetic =] I dare say that I'm not that great at it meself! But anywhos, the little bits and pieces of angst (I tried to write :P) was written just for you! Hope you like :D Maybe I can get the poetic part of my mind (if I have one :/) to continue the angst in the next chapter! But don't worry, if anyone deserves morbid treatment, it's Sasuke :[ And, I have to say, I am SHOCKED at your last statement! Favourites!? FAVOURITES!? THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!!!!! –bows- Wahh, I feel so special XP My story isn't that great izzit? Fankies!!!!!!!!!! –tears of happiness-
Iceheart19: Yep! There's nothing like a bit of carnivorous Naruto now and then, doncha think? :D Well, from here on out, its all angst I'm guessing! So, not much circus-ness in the next few chapters =] not unless I can stuff Sakura in there somewhere –shrugs- Hope you like this short update :D
Polka dot: Hee, poor Gaara ;/ Unfortunately, there's not much Gaara in this chappie :P But I had to put in some SasuNaru in there somewhere! I'm glad you're having as much fun as I am! It's so nice to torture all the characters you want and all =] Conclusion still hasn't been decided yet! Yes, my limited imagination refuses to go that far o.O –coughs- :(
Kisu: Wahh XP THANK YOU! The hardest thing in writing fanfiction is getting the characterization right! At least for me it is :P But I'm so glad you think I did it decently! THANK YOUUUU XD Maybe Sasuke will help Naruto remember some stuff =] Cuz I seriously dunno if he will! (Lazy author I am :D) I mean, Gaara taught him how to eat and shower and stuff :P If Gaara can do it, then Sasuke can too...I think ;/
Kaelas: Welps, here's the update! And it's on schedule =] Yayy –does the happy dance- Hopefully this chapter wasn't bad :P is it still getting good? I hope so, cuz I'm moving onto some SasuNaru angst next :P Well, I hope you enjoyed this update!
Michiyo-chan: Hee XP I'm with you on that one! I love Gaara-Naruto-Sasuke triangles! There's not enough of them out there! Thank you for liking my fic! It's a pain in the rear end to plan it is :P Mostly it's cuz of my limited imagination ;/ You can't help but feel sorry for the poor sucker that is Sasuke after torturing him for a good couple of chapters though =] But Gaara needs Naruto so much ;--; poor guy :( And I guess we're stuck on the same square aren't we? I can never decide whether Naruto should be with Sasuke or Gaara either! Decisions, decisions =] Hope this update was worth the wait! (That rhymes! :D) Even though it was a short chapter :P –goes in a dark corner to angst about GaaNaruSasu triangles -
Cat: -bounces off the walls in happiness- THANK YOU!!! Wahh XP I can't believe you like it that much! The excitement has toned down a bit though :P I'm glad my action scenes didn't go kaplat the minute I wrote them down! –very proud for doing herself a little bit of justice in her action scenes- But I'm still pretty sure your action sequences are better than mine :P Me and my limited imagination XP But thankfully there wasn't a lot of action here! Only suspense o.O Which is another thing I'm terrible at ;/ Yayy -.- ;;
Fallen Dragon: Evil dim sum! My family goes to dim sum every weekend! Stupid stupid dim sum XP –burns it- Cliffies are the ultimate power of authors! Don't take it away from me ;--; But the last thing I need is the wrath of reviewers! –dives into a pile of plushies for shelter- BACK! I'M ARMED WITH MY TRUSTY, HANDY-DANDY POT LID :D
Little Leila: Sasuke was never worthy to begin with! –evil cackle- Poor Gaara =] Got the exact same thing that happened to Sasuke before :D Bah, but my limited imagination couldn't think of anything else to get Gaara to stay still :P But, as much as I hate him, Sasuke needs Naruto too :( There must be some NaruSasu in this fic =] Bah, there goes my plan to have a German-homework-doer! :P But that idea doesn't sound half bad :] But don't worry, I won't make you do it =] I think I'm going to eliminate my German teacher after I'm supreme ruler of the world, which will then evolve into supreme ruler of the universe :D Lucky you XP You got summer break! I have to continue my math classes! All the math! GAHH! XP 11=11! :D
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A/N: I'm so glad all my wonderful reviewers are happy with how this story is going so far! XD Anywhos, next chapter I'll hopefully have up soon, but I'm pretty sure I'm slowly hitting a writer's block :D But I can promise you one thing! There's going to be some SasuNaru coming your way! –does the happy dance- but I wouldn't be at this point of the story today if it wasn't for all you guys! THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR REVIEWING AND READING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Tsuki (loves her readers and reviewers :3)