*PLEASE READ*

Hii I decided to re-upload this nasusasunaru on here because it's one of my favorite fanfic's and I was really devastated when it got deleted off here. I AM NOT THE AUTHOR and I don't have any way of contacting them. I am in love with this story and since I still had it on my old phone I found a way to copy it and put it on here (it takes a lot longer than I thought to copy 1 chapter), I will be uploading a chapter on here every day for people who didn't know where this story went or are looking for a great sasunarusasu to read. There are 66 CHAPTERS TOTAL but if no one really cares if it's re-uploaded I will stop bc what's the point lol. Or if the author wants me to stop re-uploading I will. please someone dm me if they have contact with the author or if anyone knows an easy way to copy a lot of text through an image because the way I do it takes hours for one chapter. thank you :)

The Long Way Home By Dashel

Part 1

The Day after

Chapter 1/1

Naruto woke to the feeling of a hot sun baking his face. He groaned, threw up a hand to shield himself from the unrelenting heat and attempted to open his eyes.

BIG MISTAKE.

The light seemed to sear his eyeballs and kept going through to his brain making him cry out softly and close his eyes quickly. So he lay there for a few moments more recovering before he attempted to sit up. He accomplished it but his joints protested painfully, his muscles seemed to be pulling against him and it took him a good few moments before he managed to get into a sitting position. He then attempted to get his eyes to adjust to the light by opening and closing them rapidly. His eyes Watered badly for a few moments, eventually the light seemed less intense and he could take a blurry peek around his surroundings for the first time since waking up.

His vision was still taking a long time to focus though, so while his surroundings were resolving themselves into things more than just green globs and brown patches he took a moment to try and figure out what the hell might have happened to him.

As far as he could remember he'd gone to sleep last night in his bed in Konoha, tucked up tightly and comfortably and now...what? He was obviously outside, on the ground and oh yeah, naked.

What the fuck?

He was beginning now to see his surroundings a little more clearly. He was in'a wood of some sort, nothing like you would see around Konoha, with tall trees surrounding the large clearing he was in. There was very little grass he found that what he had been sleeping in was mostly rocky dirt, some of which he could still feel on his back and through his hair.

He heard a muttered expletive behind him and he turned to see another person pushing themselves painfully off the ground, black hair hanging down over his face. And while Naruto's eyes struggled to make out the features of his surprise companion, his ears were also trying to figure out just where he'd heard that familiar voice before...

Naruto scrambled to his feet painfully, ignoring his body's protests at such a drastic action and got ready for a fight.

"Sasuke!"

Upon hearing his name, Sasuke looked up swiftly, blinking in the light just as Naruto had. When he managed to focus, he had pretty much the same reaction Naruto had only with different results. He tried to push himself to his feet but only got halfway before he dropped onto one knee and winced. His hand was groping for a weapon that wasn't here when he tried his best to keep his unsteady gaze on his enemy. Meanwhile, seeing Sasuke's difficulties Naruto was frowning. Sasuke seemed to be in much the same shape as him, worse even because he'd only just woken while Naruto had been conscious for a good few minutes Before he'd become aware of Sasuke. But still, there was no one else around, who else could be responsible for this curious state of affairs?

"What did you do?"

For a moment Naruto thought his voice had echoed, but in fact it was Sasuke who'd asked the question at exactly the same moment as he.

"Me?" Naruto asked indignantly.

"I didn't do anything! Last I remember I was in Konoha falling asleep in my own bed."

"You're lying," Sasuke accused harshly.

"No way!"

Sasuke finally managed to struggle to his feet and that was when Naruto remembered a little detail he'd almost forgotten about. He was stark naked. And the reason he had been reminded was because Sasuke was too. Being in this situation made his face go hot all of a sudden and he almost looked away from his old friend in embarrassment. But safety won out and he kept his eyes on the dangerous man in front of him in case he suddenly overcame his pain and decided to kill him or something.

Looking Sasuke over Naruto realized something else important, Sasuke was in pretty bad shape. Nothing major, but small cuts and bruises covered his body and made Naruto look down at himself momentarily to see that he wasn't much better off either. Looking back toward Sasuke he put a hand to his neck to find the source of a stinging pain brought on by the movement of his head and felt broken skin under his fingers, where his skin had been burnt badly.

"Then if you aren't responsible, who is?" Sasuke asked eyeing him but making no attempt to attack just yet.

"Beats me. What's the last thing you remember?"

"Going to sleep, not here."

Sasuke stretched his back slightly and winced at some pain he found there.

"Are you okay?" Naruto asked before he thought about it.

Sasuke's eyes narrowed. "What do you think, dobe?"

Well Sasuke seemed as pleasant as ever, but at least he hadn't attacked him yet. Sure that was most likely because at the moment he was probably incapable of such a feat but it gave Naruto a moment of relief anyway. The last thing he wanted was to have another showdown with Sasuke, especially not in some random unrecognizable forest gods knows where, naked and weaponless.

"You look terrible," Naruto told him bluntly. "What happened to you?"

Sasuke still hadn't attempted to get on his feet yet and looked in real pain. Perhaps he was worse off than Naruto after all because it hadn't taken this long for Naruto to recover enough to stand. Even half propped up as he was, sweat beaded his head. He looked flushed and more than a little nauseated.

"Isn't it obvious that I don't know,"

Sasuke snapped. Sasuke glared at him but Naruto had to assume that he was in much the same boat. If Sasuke wasn't responsible for this, then he was a victim as well. But a victim of what exactly? Naruto hadn't seen Sasuke in almost a year and here they suddenly were together, probably very far from home and suffering the Same weird memory loss.

On a spur of the moment, Naruto checked the skin of his upper arm to find a familiar looking cut staring back at him. He'd been hurt during his last mission which had only been two days prior to the last thing he remembered. The healing of the gash even with the Kyuubi's help looked at most two or three days older than that again. That meant he might have been out of it for at least three days.

Wait, Kyuubi!

"Are you there?" Naruto asked turning his thoughts momentarily inward. He heard nothing, he couldn't even will himself to see inside his mind. He could still feel a vague hint of the familiar presence but it seemed somehow far away.

"Hey I'm talking to you!"

Nothing.

That wasn't a good sign. He had hoped the fox would be able to shed some light on his current situation. Though admittedly getting information out of Kurama was sometimes difficult anyway if the fox wasn't in a sharing mood.

"Has your brain finally shut down completely or is there a reason you're standing there with that moronic blank look on your face?" Sasuke asked after a moment finally pushing himself onto shaky feet.

"Just thinking," Naruto replied.

"Well that explains the look."

After that the two stood facing one another, both silent and looking at the other like neither of them knew what to do about each other. Curious circumstances aside, it was weird to be here with each other when they weren't actively trying to fight one another. But Sasuke still looked a little woozy and though his stance and expression clearly conveyed how unimpressed he was at their current predicament, he still seemed unlikely to attack any time soon. Naruto figured their truce would last only as long as it took Sasuke to recover enough to move. Then he would either attack or run off, neither of which Naruto wanted to happen. Actually he was even more afraid of the second option right now. For some reason the thought of Sasuke running off and leaving him gave him an odd sort panicked feeling. Being alone right now in a confusing situation was not something he wanted to happen. As much confidence as he had in his own abilities, having someone herewith him was reassuring. Even if it was Sasuke. But of course he never used to like it when Sasuke ran off. Well maybe once.

"Do you think someone attacked us?" Naruto asked in the hope that it might make Sasuke rethink running off on his own. Of course, Sasuke had made it clear many times in the past now that he did not consider Naruto an ally, but Sasuke also wasn't stupid. If someone had the power to take both him and Sasuke on individually, Staying together would be the smart strategic thing to do right now.

"Well, I didn't strip, cut myself up and then walk gods know how far on my own. I think I would remember doing that."

"Don't be such a dick! I'm trying to figure out what happened."

"Don't hurt yourself, dobe. The who and the why doesn't matter right now, only the where."

Sasuke was right he supposed. The current threat couldn't be that great considering their state when they had awoken. If someone wanted to do them harm they had plenty of opportunities while they were out of it.

Naruto looked around again with much clearer eyes and tried to figure out if anything about the surrounding landscape looked familiar but he gave up after only a few moments.

"I've never seen trees and plants like this before," Naruto told Sasuke. "Nothing looks familiar to me."

"Me neither," Sasuke admitted.

This was bad news. Naruto had no idea how much traveling Sasuke had done over the past few years, but Naruto himself had done plenty. If he didn't recognize the landscape, they were a really long way away from home.

Sasuke was eyeing one of the nearby trees like he was contemplating jumping up there to get a better view but was obviously reluctant. Sasuke would never openly show Weakness to anyone if he could help it, but right now even standing upright looked Like it was taking all his strength.

"Um, if I go up that tree to get some lay of the landscape, will you stay put?" Naruto asked him.

Sasuke nodded and starting looking around their little clearing and Naruto finally got the impression that Sasuke had calmed down a bit. He didn't look like he wanted to fight, he didn't look like he wanted to run, he looked if anything a little confused and disorientated.

So Naruto turned his back to him and jumped up toward the lowest branch of the closest tree and...missed. Well not missed so much as fell incredibly short of his target. He Landed in the dirt at the base of the tree on his back with his wind knocked out and about six small stones embedded in his back.

Sasuke's shadow fell over him. "Problems?"

Naruto sat up and glared up at the tree like it was its fault he had fallen. "That didn't work."

"Obviously."

He got painfully back to his feet and was about to jump again when he thought better about it. Maybe he was too injured to jump high like that. Maybe he'd be better off walking up the tree. But when he placed his foot against the trunk he felt no pull, nothing keeping him in place. And then he tried really hard not to panic.

"Sasuke, does your chakra seem to be um...not working in any way?"

Sasuke didn't first and spent a few moments looking at his hand. Naruto figured he was trying to collect chakra from his palm but nothing seemed to be happening.

"This is bad" Naruto commented with wide eyes. "What the fuck happened to us?"

Sasuke seemed to be controlling his emotions better but looked a lot more wary all of A sudden. "Have you taken a good look around the clearing?"

Naruto shook his head. Why?"

"Look now and look closely."

Naruto did as instructed not really understanding what he was supposed to be seeing. It took him a while but eventually, he started seeing tell tale signs of what Sasuke meant. Some of the trees looked a little blackened where they'd been scorched, stumps stuck up out of the ground here and there with wood chunks littering the ground. The dirt under his feet look like it had been disturbed greatly. Naruto started to get the distinct impression that this hadn't been a proper or large clearing before what had happened here had…well, happened.

"An explosion?"

"Hn."

"That…doesn't explain anything. Why is our chakra gone, where the hell are we and why the fuck are we naked?"

"I saw some fresh tracks, a few people heading off in that direction," Sasuke told him gesturing. "It might be whoever did this. Or whoever robbed us afterwards."

"Seriously?"

Sasuke shrugged. "It's better than nothing. I want my clothes back and then I'm leaving."

"Sasuke, wait!"

Sasuke turned his back and Naruto grabbed his shoulder. Even though the Uchiha was having trouble moving he still managed to turn with his fist ready and hit Naruto with enough strength to snap his head sideways. Before thinking about it, and being that this was Sasuke and having the thought always in the back of his mind that Sasuke may choose to attack him moment, he automatically hit him back with more than enough force to land Sasuke on his ass in the dirt.

Sasuke was quick to get back onto his feet but Naruto had already begun regretting hitting him back. Not because he didn't deserve it, this was Sasuke after all, but because it wasn't going to help matters by starting a fight.

"Stop! We should stick together"

"Why?" Sasuke asked darkly, wiping blood off his lip with the back of his hand.

"Because we're obviously in this together. Whatever happened to us happened to both of us. We don't have our chakra and it's gone for who knows how long and someone is obviously out to get us. Sticking together right now is out best chance!"

"You want a truce."

"Well, yeah. C'mon Sasuke, I know you don't like me much but at least you know you can trust me. Right?"

Sasuke watched him for a few moments frowning.

"I don't need you."

Naruto forced a grin at the harsh words. Sasuke might not realize just how much that comment had hurt. Or he had and didn't care.

"You always need me, you just don't know it sometimes till it's almost too late. Though even then I guess you don't even realize it, But Sasuke -"

"Fine, just shut up already. If you mention one word about Konoha though, I'll hit you again," he warned.

Naruto didn't think now was a great time to point just out who had just ended up in the dirt. He saw his win so he took it and nodded.

"Lead on."

The first thing Naruto noticed about their environment was how hot it was. The sun beat Down on them relentlessly as they walked making them both sweat profusely Being naked didn't help much, actually, it probably made things worse. Sasuke was walking ahead of him, head bent against the glare and careful to follow the tracks on the ground in front of him. Naruto could see how red the skin on his shoulders and back was getting and he wondered if the sun was burning him. Naruto wasn't burning yet but he was a bit more tan than Sasuke and wouldn't suffer at all if they got the chance to cover up soon.

Not that Naruto spent much time looking at Sasuke, his old comrade was naked which made it seem wrong to look too closely. He did see enough though to feel a little bit of old annoyance creep back that he'd thought long forgotten by this point.

No matter how many years they spent apart, growing older had certainly been kind to Sasuke. They were seventeen now and Sasuke's body was all pale skin, long legs, perfect tone and well defined angles. Bastard. Did he always have to look so perfect? Why couldn't aging have given him a big nose, a little sag here and there, for fuck's sake why not even a pimple? But his skin was clear, his nose perfect and his body completely and utterly…

"Tight."

He hadn't realized it, but Sasuke had been talking to him So he'd unwittingly just blurted out the last word he'd been thinking of.

"What?" Sasuke asked.

Naruto went red from more than the sun. "Um. Nothing. What were you saying?"

Sasuke gave him an odd look. "We're close. I can smell a fire and food cooking."

Now that Naruto's attention had been drawn to it, he could smell it too. Embarrassingly it made his stomach rumble really loudly.

Naruto smiled and scratched the back of his head to try to cover up his awkwardness. "Guess it's been a while since I ate."

Sasuke sighed. "Whatever, follow me and try to be quiet."

They snuck silently forward through the bushes until they came upon a campsite. There were five men altogether sitting around and talking, passing a green bottle around and each taking a turn swigging from the contents. All the men looked dirty and down on their luck except for the one wearing the bright orange and black jacket. At least his new jacket didn't look like it had begun to rot on his body like the clothes the others were wearing. Naruto noticed how bad his jacket looked though. It was torn and scorched in a few places and he was pretty sure it must have been that way when the robbers had pried it off his body. It made him wonder yet again just what had happened to him and Sasuke and how the hell they had survived with as few injuries as they had.

What was possibly a little more disturbing was the expression on Sasuke's face as he turned back to Naruto, motioning to toward the three men sitting together on one side of the fire and then at Naruto. The message was clear and even clearer still when Sasuke ran his finger across his throat to indicate just what he expected Naruto to do to them. Sasuke's face was calm but his dark eyes shone with an enthusiasm that made Naruto incredibly uneasy.

Naruto shook his head.

Sasuke looked confused for a moment so Naruto made it clearer for him. Copying the same 'kill them' signal as Sasuke had done and then shaking his head more emphatically. These men might have robbed them, stripped them down and left them unconscious in a clearing but as far as Naruto knew they hadn't hurt either of them and even though they had the opportunity, hadn't taken the chance to kill them either.

Sasuke gave him his best 'don't be stupid' look, but Naruto was adamant. He wasn't rebelling against the idea of attacking and taking back their stuff, so he tried everything he could think of to silently convey to Sasuke that they should knock them out rather than kill them. As Sasuke watched him, working out Naruto's sometimes wild gestures, his expression grew less and less impressed by the second. But eventually, he seemed to think it through and still nodded despite his very apparent disagreement.

Naruto sighed in relief and left Sasuke to circle around behind the men he was supposed to be dealing with and trying to think up a plan of attack. When he was ready he waited, a few more seconds to make sure Sasuke would be in position too and stood up and stepped out of the bushes, bedding up his hands to focus his chakra.

"Multi Shadow.." Then he remembered and felt very stupid All of the men had turned to watch him and he grinned at them nervously.

"Oh yeah, can't do that." So instead he kicked the closest man in the face, stepped in and hit one that was just rising to face him, moved in, turned and elbowed the third in his midsection whooshing his sour breath out and dropping him into the dirt. Naruto turned to see if any of them had gotten up yet and were going to attack him but mostly they were just clutching their faces, trying to breathe or completely out for the count. Sasuke stood on the other side of the fire, three unconscious men at his feet, a knife -wherever that had come from- clasped loosely in his hand and a 'you're such a moron' look on his face.

"I forgot for a second, okay?" Naruto told him defensively. Then in a softer tone, "Ne Sasuke, you didn't kill 'em did you?"

"They'll live, Search for our stuff."

Together they turned the little campsite inside out looking for their things but didn't have all that much luck. In a bag Naruto found his tee-shirt, Sasuke's shoes and his own head protector minus the cloth headband part but that was all. None of their weapons, neither of their pants and Naruto's shoes were missing not to mention their money.

"Maybe they ditched the stuff that didn't fit them, Naruto wondered out loud as Sasuke casually knocked out one of Naruto's groaning victims with his heel to their head. "And you know we might ask them if you'd stop knocking them out."

"My katana is a valuable weapon," Sasuke reminded him. "Nobody would 'ditch' it. It's possible they weren't the first ones to find us."

Naruto looked around. "You think there are that many people in this wilderness that would pick the clothes off unconscious people?"

"They might have thought we were dead."

"Then they weren't looking really hard, were they?"

"Look at these men," Sasuke started pointedly. "I think we were lucky they didn't pry the teeth out of our heads. These men are scavengers. I've seen this in areas before. We should find a big town not too far away and probably a lot of unfriendly people between us and it."

"I don't get it,"

"People come out of the city, bandits rob them, probably kill them, and then these bands of scavengers pick through whatever is left over. It happens."

"Not around Konoha!"

"Course not you idiot. What robber in their right mind would steal from people or kill them so close to a large ninja stronghold? But it happens near large towns with little to no ninja bases often enough."

"That's awful!"

"That's life," Sasuke said shrugging like he didn't care. "There were more than five Sets of tracks around where we woke up, but these were the only ones that left us a steady trait doubt we will catch up with the other thieves now."

"Well at least there are other clothes," Naruto muttered upending the bag he was looking through.

It was true enough, these scavengers might not have the richest haul in their inventory but it did consist of a lot of clothes, worthless jewelry and other assorted junk. He decided not to retrieve his jacket for two reasons. One, it was pretty ruined and ripped, and two, because the guy that was wearing it smelt like he'd been swimming in a latrine.

Wherever they were, the clothes tended to be of a brown to beige coloring and the pair of them sorted through the bags until they found something that would fit them.

Naruto's mouth twisted as he pulled on a pair of brown pants. "These were probably taken off a dead person, right?"

Sasuke looked over at him as he pulled his own beige pants on. "Um, probably not."

"How can you tell?"

"Because they're clean."

Naruto told himself that Sasuke was talking about blood. He really hoped Sasuke was talking about blood.

He put his own black tee-shirt on and waited for Sasuke to put his shoes on and find a shirt to wear. They hadn't been able to find Naruto any shoes, anything they found were way too small or way too big. He could have made do and saved the soles of his feet some pain by wearing them but he didn't like the idea of such shoes hampering his movements should the need arise to defend himself suddenly. He couldn't totally rely on the fact that Sasuke would protect him while he kicked ill fitting shoes off so he could fight and not trip over.

While he waited he went through a few more junk bags, just in case he missed something from before. He upended one bag that he'd previously ransacked, shaking it out. A small orb about the size of an eyeball dropped into the clothes littering the ground. Curiously, Naruto picked it up and rolled it around in his hand. It was a prey thing, pearl like in coloring but marbled like granite. Multi-colored flecks in the surface caught the fading light and sparkled. It felt very heavy as he weighed it in his hand.

"What is it?" Sasuke asked coming up to stand behind him, tying on a dark green short sleeved shirt he'd found that wrapped around him and tied up at the side.

"I dunno," Naruto said turning his hand this way and that. "Do you think it's valuable?"

"I've never seen anything like it before,' Sasuke admitted. "Pretty, but I doubt it's worth much if these monkeys had it."

Sasuke was probably right but Naruto still slipped it into his pocket along with the metal plate of his Konoha headband as he stood up. "Okay so, what now?"

"I suggest we find this town and then a map. These men had a little money on them so at least we might find some food and… why are you looking at me like that?"

Naruto grinned. "'You said 'we'. I guess this means you do want to stick together."

Sasuke looked annoyed. "Weren't you the one insisting we stick together?"

"Yeah, but I didn't think you'd still want to after we found these guys."

Sasuke looked around at the men Naruto had downed, the one he had hit with his fist only just starting to come around again. "You're not completely useless," Sasuke begrudgingly admitted. "What you said makes sense. At least until we get back to somewhere familiar."

Naruto's grin widened. "Thanks. You're not so useless yourself. You're not gonna regret this, believe it!"

Sasuke scowled and turned away. "Really, because I think I already am."

TBC in Part 2,

please tell me if there are any grammar errors when I scan my old phone sometimes it misinterprets a couple of words, comment, or dm me :)