A/N: Sorry for such a long wait, everyone. I tried to make it longer, considering you all waited so long to begin with. The thing is, I have an idea for another fic and I want to get this one finished ASAP. So, yeah, bear with me here… please….

Sasuke's eyes narrowed when he saw the person in front of him. Everything and everyone else were frozen like statues except for himself and the very last person he wanted to see at the moment.

"Hello, little brother."

"Why are you here?" Sasuke asked.

"What a nice way to greet you older brother. All questions will be answered later, however. We don't have time now," Itachi responded. He reached out for Sasuke, but wasn't fast enough. Sasuke sprung out of the way smoothly with a back handspring… only to fall into Itachi's waiting arms. He was caught, and he had hardly fought at all. Was he that weak? That he couldn't even stand against his brother for less that a minute? That was pathetic! Sasuke knew he could do better. Well… maybe if he had come prepared. He had left all of his kunai and shuriken back at his apartment.

Damnit! Why had he left them there? The one time he really needed them, he had left them behind. Great- that was just fantastic!

Sasuke elbowed his brother in the stomach, only to get no response.

"Now, now, Sasuke. You'd better learn to control your temper. I'll have no wild servants in my house."

Servants? What was he talking about? Sasuke was no servant, and that was a fact!

"I don't think so!" he shouted at Itachi. With a lot of effort… Sasuke got nowhere. In fact, Itachi had knocked him out cold before anything drastic could happen.

-

Naruto was bored out of his mind. He tried to train, but couldn't focus. Big surprise there- he could hardly focus anyway, without the help of Sasuke. He had tried just walking around. But no, it didn't do any good. He felt lonely all by himself out on the streets. So he high tailed it home. There was nothing waiting for him there, though. He had thrown his jacket off to the side in frustration, not caring that it had landed in the sink with all his dirty dishes. Man, all those dishes stunk up Naruto's house. He had been so embarrassed when Sasuke had stepped in. Naruto had seen his nose twitch and his eyebrows rise and then furrow, trying to identify the smell. Luckily though, the raven-haired boy hadn't asked Naruto about it, because Naruto would have died of mortification.

Heaving an exaggerated sigh, Naruto sat on the edge of his bed. What was wrong with him? How did he usually get things out of his head? It was like having a song playing over and over in your head, only worse. Sasuke's voice played in his mind and his image would not leave him be. The only way to get the other boy out of his mind, Naruto concluded, was to go see him again…

-

Cold… That was all Sasuke could feel. He curled into a ball, but no heat was made from it. His curling was in vain. Without much of a choice, Sasuke sat up… and realized why exactly he was so cold.

He had been laying on a pile of chains that were freezing cold and glinted menacingly in the darkness of… wherever it was that he had awoken. There were large red indents going up and down his back, which had been exposed to the heavy chains. He still had on his shorts and boxers, though, which was better than nothing.

"I see you've woken up," said an eerie voice from the shadows, startling Sasuke, who pressed himself up against the wall. Bad idea: the hard, chilly bricks behind him seemed to be so cold that they burned into his skin. But he didn't pull away, he stayed pressed tightly against the wall, but he couldn't stop his teeth from chattering.

Apparently this was amusing to Itachi, who just watched with the hint of a smile curling the very edges of his tight lips. Sasuke would have growled had his teeth not been chattering so violently at the moment.

"I'm glad to see you're not injured too badly. Sometimes I underestimate my own power…"

"Where am I?" Sasuke tried to ask in his deepest, most intimidating voice. It came out as a mere whimper.

"In my house," Itachi answered dully, looking bored suddenly. "Didn't I tell you all of this already? You will be serving me here."

"I serve no one…" Narrowed eyes made Sasuke look far more fierce than usual. Itachi had known his bastard younger brother was strong-willed, but no one was so insolent to him. No one… Stepping forward, Itachi reached for Sasuke, but the younger boy crawled back along the wall, away from his towering older brother. Itachi just stepped forward again, Sasuke continuing to scoot away. It wasn't until it was too late that Sasuke noticed the heap of chain was no longer piled up, but pulled taunt. His foot was so numb from the cold that he hadn't felt the metal clasp around his ankle. That wasn't good…

"Let me show you something…" Itachi leaned down, wrapped a hand around the chain, and squeezed. The links immediately snapped open as if they were nothing more than pretzels- twisted about to hold Sasuke in this prison. Sasuke, realizing that he might have a chance, tried to get up and run, hoping he would be strong enough to make his brother release the iron grip he had on the chain. Yeah, right. Like that was going to happen. Itachi held fast and Sasuke nearly broke his ankle tugging on the chain.

"What do you want with me?" Sasuke said, the sheer terror of his situation finally dawning on him. Why did Itachi always have to torture him? Why did Itachi even care anymore? He knew he was stronger than Sasuke; he didn't have to prove his point this way. It was completely useless.

"Personally, I don't want anything from you. But you are the key to getting what I do want. Besides, we need to spend more quality time…" The way Itachi said those two words made them sound worse than venom. What kind of 'quality time' did Itachi have in mind, exactly?…

-

Naruto couldn't do it- he chickened out. How could he go face Sasuke now, when he was on a date with another person? Besides, Naruto didn't need to see him; he was perfectly capable of getting the raven-haired boy out of his mind all on his own?

But why did his blood boil every time he thought about that girl Sasuke was on the date with? Why hadn't he cared about whom Sasuke did what with up until now? It was enough to make Naruto have a brain hemorrhage on the spot! Too many questions were flying through Naruto's brain at once. So many "who's" and "what if's" and "buts." Naruto was not infatuated with any boy. He liked Sakura, with her beautiful, silky, pink hair and glowing smile… but didn't Sasuke's smile glow twice as brightly- well, when you could get him to smile in the first place? And wasn't Sasuke's hair just as gorgeous and silky as Sakura's?

Naruto wanted to say no; no Sasuke's hair wasn't even lovelier than Sakura's, and no, his teeth didn't sparkle like a long-lost star in the sky. Naruto wanted to say no, but it wouldn't be right- he'd do nothing but lie to himself that way, and Naruto was tired of lies, even if he was the one making them…

With heavy footsteps, Naruto turned around. He was drained, completely and totally drained. Well, emotionally, anyway. Either way, the only thing Naruto wanted was to lie down and close his eyes. He was tired of being confused and sick of seeing the raven-haired boy with every new thought that invaded his head. He wanted to be left alone…

-

Sasuke had only been here a week and he was already ready to shoot himself in the head or slit his wrists or hang himself from the roof- just something to get him out of this place. It wasn't the being kicked around (literally), or the having to bid to every one of Itachi's problems- it was the broken feeling inside of him. He couldn't get away; there was nothing he could do. And he didn't have to be here in the first. Along the grapevine, he had heard that Itachi was actually after Naruto. Why was beyond anything Sasuke could conjure up, but that was what he had been told.

The serious drop in Sasuke's pride didn't help either. The second night he had been here, Itachi had raped him, the sick bastard! Sasuke had been huddled in the darkness of the basement, thinking- planning- when he had heard the door open. Sasuke had stood ready to move, to make his escape. He had eventually gotten accustomed to the feeling of numbness that constantly enveloped him.

Then he didn't know what had happened. He had been dragged to Itachi's room kicking and crying out violently. Then he had been chained to the bed. He could barely even get his foot on the ground, the metal lengths holding him to the bed were so short.

All Sasuke really recalled of the hours Itachi had spent with him was the pain. It had hurt so badly. Not just physically, either. The pain that had ticked in his heart and mind were just as excruciating as the painful shudders that had taken over his body as he cried.

And Itachi's words. What he said had burned Sasuke's ears, had completely blown his mind.

"You know, little brother, little Sasuke, I killed them for you."

"No," Sasuke had denied feebly, his voice shaky and weak, tears still streaming from his eyes with no sign of stopping.

"Oh yes. With them around, you wouldn't have become who you were meant to be. You should be thanking me, Sasuke…"

"No," Sasuke had said a little more loudly, but not any less feebly. He was naked on the bed, with Itachi lying next to him, twisting his long fingers through Sasuke's silky, raven-black hair, he couldn't feel superior like this, there was no way.

So, a week later, Sasuke was completely at a loss. What in God's name was going to happen to him if he didn't get out of here? He didn't want to think about it, but with so much silence, there was nothing to do but think about it. Would he become Itachi's time-wasting toy?

God, please don't let that happen… Sasuke pleaded helplessly as he finished scrubbing the floor of Itachi's personal bathroom.

"I'm finished, Itachi," Sasuke stood in front of his brother and took off the gloves he'd been wearing. Bitterly, he threw them at Itachi's face, but they were swatted away effortlessly. Sasuke turned to leave, but Itachi caught his wrist and spun him back around. Sasuke was startled by the sudden close proximity.

"You'll soon learn to be more respectful to you master," Itachi spat at him through clenched teeth. He was just about sick of Sasuke's temper and disregard to the people of Itachi's household.

"What more could you possibly do to teach me anything?" Sasuke fired back.

"You'd be surprised…"

For just a moment, when Itachi looked into Sasuke's cold, hard eyes, his own glare softened. He released his grip on Sasuke and turned away.

"Go get my dinner," Itachi said in a suddenly bored tone. Looking at Sasuke always made Itachi hungry. Maybe it wasn't food he hungered rather than Sasuke's love, but something had to fill that deep void, and food was a temporary cure.

"No." Sasuke was sick of this. He wouldn't play the housemaid anymore. He had been broken, but his will and spirit were starting to mend again. His pride would never be the same, most likely, but he'd just have to cope with that.

"You don't want to disobey me right now, Sasuke" Itachi fair warned.

"I'm sorry, should I save it for later?" Sasuke folded his arms defiantly and put all his weight on one foot.

Itachi barely even looked up before he had Sasuke pinned to the wall, his breath cold on his younger brother's face. But Sasuke didn't even flinch, didn't even make a sound. That surprised Itachi. He had expected Sasuke to start screaming again like he had last time it'd come to this point, but apparently the younger one wasn't quite so scared anymore. After all, he now knew what was coming to him.

"Aren't you scared?" Itachi asked in the mere breath of a whisper.

"Should I be?"

That had done it that was the last straw. Itachi was sick of Sasuke's smart-ass replies, but for some unfathomable reason, at this specific moment, they made his brother appear even more irresistible. Itachi suddenly wondered if he wouldn't like to keep Sasuke rather than Naruto. It was his brother and he knew him far well than he did anyone else. Besides, it gave him pleasure to see his brother at such a feeble point, at his control.

But something that Itachi hadn't expected happened when he leaned his head in closer and planted his lips on Sasuke's. Something definitely wasn't right. What was the sharp pain Itachi felt exploding in his stomach. Heat spread all throughout his body and he crumpled to the ground, a smile on his face.

"Very good… Sasuke…" he said weakly.

-

What had Naruto done? There was a huge panic in the city of Konoha about where Sasuke had disappeared to. Some said they weren't surprised, others said that he had been chased away by someone or another. But Naruto thought it was himself that had caused Sasuke to leave. Maybe he had been a little too obvious about his feelings for Sasuke.

One thing was for sure though: Naruto did have feelings for Sasuke, and they were extreme. A week away from the dark-haired boy had nearly driven him crazy, but he now knew. He loved Sasuke more than he'd ever loved anyone in his life. And now he was gone- Sasuke was gone and, so far, no one was going to be able to bring him back.

Naruto ran the streets like a maniac, trying desperately to find some clue as to where Sasuke may have gone… but to avail. Finally, when Naruto gave up, he went back to his apartment. He flopped onto his bed and crashed…

A/N: Yeah, sorry if there are any mistakes. I surprisingly had a few hours to spare on trying to get this chapter up between doing other things. The rest of me weekend is so packed, though, I wouldn't expect any more chapters squeezed out of me. Maybe next week. Sorry.

Alley-Oop