Fire: This is Chapter 8. It's almost the end now.

Sasuke: I can't believe Naruto doesn't believe I'm the real Sasuke!

Fire: Are you the real Sasuke?

Sasuke: Yes!

Kakashi: (pulls the Bag of Reviews out quickly) Must change the subject with some reviews. Must change the… (rummages in the bag for some reviews) …subject with some reviews. Here! (holds out the review window to Fire)

Fire: (takes the review) Arigatou, Kakashi!

Kakashi: Just read it.

Fire: Slaver driver.

Kakashi: (slumps) Just read it so we can get on with the story.

Fire: I already have!

Kakashi: And?

Fire: I replied using the reply button!

Kakashi: Anything you want to address in general before I pull up the first chapter?

Fire: Here's some general information. For people who want me to upload all the chapters at once, there really aren't that many chapters left, so I don't think I'll do it. And if I did, Sasuke will probably kill me.

Sasuke: I don't want to do it.

Fire: There are ten chapters and an epilogue, so if you exclude this chapter, there are two chapters and an epilogue left.

Kakashi: That doesn't really help.

Fire: Okay! There are three chapters left for people who want to read the epilogue and two chapters left for people who don't want to read the epilogue. It all ends on a cliffhanger since it runs into the first book of the Wait for Me Series, Wait for Me: Leaving anyway!

Sasuke: Fire's beginning to lose it. Better hurry on with the chapter.

Fire: Matte! I want the last word!

Sasuke: I get the last word. There it is! (pulls up chapter 8)

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Chapter 8: Facets of Pain

As Kisame walked back toward the Taki no kuni/Hi no Kuni border after his fight with Sasuke–and a few other not so short fights along the way–Samehada was complaining on his back, but there was never any time when the sword wasn't annoying him. The sword was always hungry.

And Samehada was tugging at him again. Chakra! Chakra! That way! Samehada pointed to the north. Big chakra! Big chakra that way!

Kisame sighed as he looked in the direction Samehada was pointing. He was sure that it wasn't that big of a chakra, but Samehada was still hungry. There was no way that he could just leave it alone. His sword wasn't going to shut up if he didn't let it eat. And he wasn't going to get any peace until he found that chakra.

'Chikusho. And we're almost back too!' Kisame allowed his sword to drag him away, almost in the exact opposite direction he was headed in. But it wasn't as if Itachi would be more angry if he was distracted for a few extra days. He had already spent enough time feeding Samehada. A few extra days weren't going to make a difference. What was a few extra days when he had already spent more than a month away from their base?

"Che! If Itachi beats me up, I'm not feeding you for a month," he grumbled to Samehada. But he had to admit, it was good to be away from Itachi every once in a while.

The sound of clashing kunai filled the air amid bewildered stares from the blond jinnchuuriki. Naruto was staring because he knew the truth. He wouldn't have been staring if he could deny it. And there was no denying what he suspected. The Sasuke that he had dreamed of, and the Sasuke that stood here in this sickroom were the same Sasuke, but different.

His Sasuke was the Sasuke of memory. Blue shirt with Uchiha crest on the back. White-beige shorts with black shuriken pouches on the side and a sandy beige kunai pouch on the back. White arm-warmers with blue trim on either arm. Soft black hair that blew around his head when he fought.

At least the hair was right.

He should have known that they would change...but he didn't want to imagine that it might happen. He had wanted to pretend that nothing would change between them, that Sasuke was still here, that they could still grow up together and be shinobi together. But after all that time, all the waiting and all the searching, he just couldn't take it anymore.

He had known that he had left, that he had gone to Orochimaru, that he was gone...and after all that time, he had to allow himself some denial, some fantasy to keep himself sane. After being alone for so long, he finally had someone to share his loneliness, someone who understood what it was like to be alone, someone who trusted him completely...only to have Sasuke leave. That was enough to drive him insane.

The Sasuke he had imagined was the Sasuke of long ago. It was the Sasuke who had kissed him, had shared his days with him and had kept him company. That was the Sasuke that loved him.

But that was only a dream.

The Sasuke who stood in front of him was different. As Naruto had suspected, there was no hitai-ate. He remembered that he had given it back to him right before he left, but he had always imagined Sasuke with a Konoha hitai-ate on his head. And he was taller. That was all Naruto could admit to. His clothes were different, but the blond ignored it. It was hard to focus on the clothes when the face that he remembered in his dreams was right in front of him.

But that kiss... Just the memory of that kiss was enough to make Naruto's breath flutter, his mind swim with dizziness. Even in his dreams, Sasuke had never kissed him like that.

"Stop fighting," Naruto said slowly as he regained his footing. He focussed on the Uchiha brothers in front of him again. "Stop fighting! We're in a hospital!" Although it was a lame excuse for what Naruto was feeling at that moment. He could feel the equivalent of every one of Karasu's hidden weapons skewering his body from the inside...every katana of every ANBU in Konoha slicing his skin apart...every knife and senbon in the hospital embedding themselves in his bleeding chest. "Itachi!" His blood was rushing through his body and he wanted to stop them even though he was still too frozen to do it, and his shouting wasn't quite loud enough with the searing pain that was spreading through his chest.

However, they heard it just the same.

"Nani!" Sasuke turned quickly to Naruto, all thoughts of his brother gone for that one split second. He didn't just hear what he thought he had heard. He couldn't have heard what he thought he had heard.

Naruto covered his mouth with both hands, his eyes wide as they stared at Sasuke. His unbeating heart crashed through the floor at the Uchiha's word. He couldn't believe what he had just said. He was sure that he didn't just say what he thought he had said. But that wasn't all. Cold sweat broke out over his body as he felt red eyes watching him.

Itachi was staring at him.

'Stop staring at me. Stop staring at me!' Naruto felt his heart leap from the ground into his throat to choke him, felt his chest tighten, his face beaming bright red in embarrassment at the continuing stare. 'Sasuke's right here!'

"What...did...you...say?" Sasuke was brimming with smouldering anger. His dark eyes stared hard at Naruto.

The blond took a cautious step back. He didn't remember Sasuke being so angry...but he might have forgotten. It had been such a long time since they were last together. "I–it's a hospital. You can't fight in here!" He looked to Itachi who only looked away from him. They had actually stopped fighting! Naruto couldn't believe that the Uchiha brothers were actually standing in the same room with each other, and they weren't killing each other! They were just standing there. "H–how about we just go outside for a little while?" The pain in his chest was becoming worse. He wasn't sure how much longer he could even stand like this.

Sasuke stared at Naruto for a while longer before looking at his brother once more. It was going to take a lot more for him to forget about Itachi. Just because Naruto said to stop didn't mean that he was going to stop. He had hated him for years.

It was too late to stop now.

"How about...no!" Sasuke redirected the anger that had flared up at Naruto's outburst of "Itachi" to Itachi. He didn't want to be angry at Naruto. He shouldn't be angry at Naruto. That was why he had the bastard.

Sasuke sprang at his brother, three kunai and shuriken in each hand.

It took a moment for Itachi to make the decision, but he jumped right at Naruto as soon as he saw the shuriken in his brother's hands. The six tomoe in Sasuke's red eyes spun as Itachi fell through the first floor window to the outside air. He hadn't expected that Itachi would try to run–since Itachi wasn't a coward–but he had expected that he would go for Naruto. He was supposed to be here for the jinchuuriki after all.

With an inaudible curse under his breath, the younger Uchiha jumped through the broken window, after his elder brother. He knew that Itachi couldn't get away that easily. With the snow all around them, his footprints would definitely give his position away. There was no way that Itachi could go anywhere without Sasuke following.

However, Itachi was nowhere near his brother. He had Naruto. Now was the time to get back to Akatsuki. He was already blocks away from the hospital. It shouldn't be that difficult. It shouldn't have been difficult.

But Naruto's quiet whisper into his chest momentarily froze Itachi to the ground. "Was it you?" He was close...so close to leaving and returning to Akatsuki with the jinchuuriki in hand, and the elder Uchiha couldn't make his body move. The weight of the blond boy that clung to his chest for support was too much.

"..." He held the blond tight, half afraid that he would escape, half afraid of something he didn't understand. "..." That something which Naruto was clinging to, that question which Naruto had whispered. He didn't understand what Naruto wanted from him. He just wanted to capture him for the organization. That was all. There was no hidden agenda behind it.

"Itachi..."

The Kyuubi was shouting at Naruto. His head ached from the kitsune's repeated screams, even as his chest threatened to burst with suppressed pressure. 'Kill him. Kill him. He just wants to kill you!' The Kyuubi was screaming at him, and he couldn't stand it.

"Itachi..." Naruto clutched the elder man in his shaking arms. Even in the intense pain that called for attention, his mind dwelled on that one question. He couldn't accept that the Sasuke he had dreamt of didn't exist. He was real. What they had was real. And that meant that... "It was you, wasn't it?" ...it had to be Itachi. Itachi cared about him. That had to be true! Even if he had to kill him, that had to be true.

"No." Itachi's single answer was cold and final. There was no way around it. There was no mistaking what he said for anything other than what it was. No. "Forget what you dreamt. It was nothing." A single kunai in Naruto's heart... "It wasn't me." ...and it went all the way through. Pain spread through the blond's body as surely as the blood through his veins. Even though it was dulled against a backdrop of pain that was already there, there was the unmistakable pain of knowing. It was all a dream. It was only a dream.

The blond squeezed his eyes shut as he crumpled against the solid wall that was Itachi. Finally, the Kyuubi's words were coming through. There was no way around it. He couldn't just go with Itachi. He wasn't going to just die like that. He was stronger than that.

He still had to become Hokage.

"Itachi..." he said softly as he loosened his hold on the other man, his hand reaching up to touch the taller man's face even as his other hand reached stealthily toward the kunai pouch at his side. Itachi didn't pull away, but then, Itachi had always been a calm man. He wasn't the type to pull away from anything. "Itachi..."

'...I...'

"I wish..."

'...life really was as simple...'

He closed his eyes, lightly pressed warm lips against Itachi's mouth.

'...as simple as this.'

And in the grey world of falling snow, there were only snowflakes to interrupt Naruto's final gesture. Then, there was only a cloud of red mist in the air.

Sasuke couldn't find them. He looked all around and ran frantically in circles, but his own footprints only served to confuse him. And there were more than one pair of footprints on the high traffic street...not to mention that they shovelled the streets every morning so there wasn't a lot of snow on the ground to produce those footprints he was hoping for.

But he didn't need to look any further as a Naruto bunshin flew through the air pass Sasuke only to land against the wall. It vanished in a tendril of smoke as the sound of flying shuriken sliced through the air. And as the younger Uchiha turned, he could see the remnants of a red cloud hanging over the area.

The dark-haired shinobi ran toward the origin of that sound, the sound of air-cutting shuriken and clashing kunai, of vanishing bunshin and accurate attacks. He couldn't just let Naruto do all the work. He–and only he–was supposed to kill Itachi. He couldn't allow Naruto to beat him to it.

End Chapter 8

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Fire's English tidbits for those who care:

Welcome to character development! Yay! For stories without a major plotline, this is the most important property. Stories without a plotline only have their characters to draw in the reader, so it's important to allow your characters to grow and change. Character development as an additional property, as opposed to regular character as a basic component, is completely different in the way they look at characters of a story. With the basic component "character," you define who your character is, their mannerisms, their likes and dislikes, their psyche, etc. When you write your story, your character's actions are governed by these characteristics. On the other hand, the additional property "character development," allows you to change what you have in "character" so that your character can act completely out of character in those circumstances. That means that according to events that happen to your character during the course of your storyline, you can make your character grow and change into a completely different person. For example, Kishimoto-sensei created Sasuke as a boy who just wanted to become stronger. At the beginning of the series, Sasuke merely wanted to become a stronger shinobi. Fighting stronger opponents is a part of that goal to better himself and hone his skills. However, during his encounter with Orochimaru, he receives the cursed seal which changed his mind and revealed to him why he wanted power. It is at that point that he decides that he is an avenger, and that he will do anything for power, even if it is evil power. That sets up everything that he does later on, and it doesn't come as a surprise when he decides that he wants to kill Naruto for the sake of power. Now, I know that not all of you think you can write something like that, but the basic question to write character development is "why are they like this" and "what made them like this?" Remember that everyone has a past that made them the way they are today. Everything your characters do is because of their past. As writers, it is your job to create a past for them and chronicle it as if it was true history. I hope this wasn't too long. See you next time for grammar and devices.

Fire's babbling:

Naruto: (looks up at the English tidbits) I don't even want to try reading that.

Sasuke: Why are you talking about me again?

Fire: You're easier to use as an example.

Sasuke: Use someone else next time.

Kakashi: Use me! Use me!

Fire: I was going to use you, but that would have been spoiler content and I didn't write a warning about spoilers for this series.

Kakashi: (slumps in disappointment) Souka.

Fire: Maybe for the next story, but not in this series, okay, Kakashi?

Kakashi: Hai, hai.

Sasuke: (stares at the story) Aah! He did it again! Why does he keep kissing my dobe!

Fire: Itachi didn't do anything there. That was Naruto.

Naruto: All part of my plan!

Sasuke: (yelling at Naruto) You don't love me at all! Just admit that you love that bastard!

Fire: You're overreacting. Naruto said that he had a plan, so you should at least wait until the next episode before you crucify him.

Naruto: Yeah. Y— Hey! Don't crucify me!

Fire: Now, review! I know that you had a few thoughts and opinions on this chapter!

Ssauke: Yeah, like how Naruto can have a kunai pouch with him when he just woke up from a genjutsu-induced coma. Doesn't he have one of those surgical gowns on, or something?

Fire: No. (confused) Of course not. He was under observation with strict orders not to operate on him for fear that others might fall under the genjutsu. He wasn't there for an operation. Of course he won't be wearing a surgical gown if he isn't going into surgery!

Kakashi: Souka.

Fire: Now, review! I know you have lots to say to me. Was anything confusing or annoying? Did you like the chapter or hate the chapter? I need to know what you think! Opinions. Send me your opinions!

Sasuke: And Fire's having another meltdown. How many is it now?

Naruto: (shrugs) I'm going for some ramen. Ramen! Ramen! (walks away toward Ichiraku Ramen)

Kakashi: Several hundred?

Sasuke: Must be more.

Fire: See you next chapter when I'll hopefully be less insane. Bye!

Sasuke: You mean you have problems other than the schizophrenia?

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