TRIGGER WARNING NOW: elements of rape in this chapter(not explicit), and also extreme elements of violence. You have been warned.
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"You have to work grave tonight?" Naruto asked from the side of the bed. It was about six in the evening, and Sasuke had to be at work at seven.

"Yeah, the night manager called out with some kind of family emergency and they need me to come in until the morning manager can get there."

"How the hell are you gunna go to school in the morning?"

"I'll be getting off at like three or so-I can just squeeze in a nap and figure it out. They wouldn't ask me to do this unless they were desperate."

Naruto nodded his head, mulling it over. "It still sucks."

"Oh, you're telling me. I haven't even worked a mid-shift in like two years. I'm gunna need at least seven cups of coffee to keep up. But, hey, I get off at three so I could pick you up from work in the morning."

"Pft, don't even worry about me. I gotta work off the take-out we get somehow. Not like we can afford a gym membership."

"Or use the apartments' equipment-the manager is never there."

"Never there." Naruto echoed, with a nod. "I wonder what it's like to make 60k a year and never have to deal with your tenants."

"Got into the wrong business." Sasuke agreed. He walked back over to the side of the bed. "Go back to sleep," He leaned over and gave the blond a kiss. "I love you."

"Love you, too."

At about eight, Naruto caved and called Shikamaru for a ride to work. He had looked out the window briefly and it had begun to dump rain in spectacular fashion. Not like Naruto wasn't used to the rain, but not having to walk to work in it, would be the rather favorable experience.

And that meant Naruto-as he smiled cheekily to himself-could go back to sleep for another hour and change. The blond happily pulled the covers back over his head, very satisfied with the turn of events.

When his alarm went off for him to put on his work clothes and actually get ready-the blond felt groggy. He cursed. Wasn't sleep supposed to be the reason he felt good? He wanted to lay in bed for another few minutes but knew he would just end up dozing off again. He reluctantly got up from the bed, shivering slightly at the cool feeling of the apartment.

The night was strangely quiet. It wasn't a weekend or anything, but it just seemed extra still. Not that anyone seemed to mind at work. Naruto was able to get through task after task without being really bothered. It just made the time slip by so slowly. He blinked-once, twice, and again, just staring at the door. He'd been stuck at register while Shikamaru made copies of the gas reports for morning and Choji finished up re-stocking the beer cooler.

"Sorry that took so long," Shikamaru sighed as he slipped the pieces of paper into a folder on the counter. He shook his head. "No one replaced the stupid ink cartridge, idiots."

"It's cool, man." Naruto replied, still feeling spacey and tired. He had been groggy the whole shift, which added even more to the dragging feeling.

Both of them jumped slightly when the phone rang. Shikamaru leaned over and answered it promptly. Choji's face was red as he emerged from the back, pulling off the pair of leather gloves they kept around so people's hands wouldn't get too cold.

"What the fuck does mid even do?" Choji shot off. "Like serious, they didn't put away Harbor or our fucking Pepsi delivery. It's still a nightmare in there."

"Yeah, and we got shit for space right now." Naruto replied.

"True nightmare," Choji muttered. Naruto pressed safe-drop so he could deposit the few hundreds he had in his till from an earlier trucker-he'd finished pumping and used everything. He was depositing money into the safe, listening to Choji continue to complain about all the Gatorade in the back and how there was nowhere to put anything.

"Naruto," the blond stopped what he was doing and looked up at Shikamaru-his face had gotten pale. He set the phone down and took a small breath. "Sasuke's been in accident."

"WHAT?"

"That was his boss. They said they couldn't reach you by your personal phone, so they called the store." Naruto dropped the money he was putting in the safe back into his till and ran to the breakroom. He shuffled through his things and grabbed his phone, seeing four missed calls from an unknown number. He didn't have any texts or calls from Sasuke.

His stomach churned. His hands began to sweat and shake with the horror of it. Scrolling through his contacts, he tried to call Sasuke's brother-Itachi. He would have probably been the first person they called, but Itachi didn't pick up the phone. He frantically called him three more times before throwing his phone across the table. Letting out a shaky breath, he paused for a moment, pacing the floor. What would he do now? He didn't know where Sasuke was-and probably wouldn't be able to call him if he was unconscious or…

Worse.

Shikarmaru appeared in the doorway of the breakroom, leaning slightly against the doorframe. "Hey, listen. Go home." He said it softly and the blond didn't look over to him. "I already talked to Choji and we'll be fine here without you for the rest of the night."

"Fuck." Naruto muttered to himself. He carded a hand through his hair and looked back at his abandoned phone. "Itachi isn't answering."

"He might already be there. They couldn't give me any specifics over the phone-just go home, try to call Sasuke or maybe his parents and try to figure out what's going on. I wouldn't force you to stay here with his hanging over your head."

Naruto took a deep breath. "I'm really sorry."

"Not your fault." Shikamaru replied quickly.

Naruto packed up his stuff and clocked out. He headed back towards the front of the store, not even giving a goodbye before walking out the door. He muttered to himself as he, again, tried to call Itachi. Itachi was a notorious night owl and he knew for a fact the man always had his phone on full volume-he was a police officer and they could need him at the drop of a hat.

But, of course, now, while there was an emergency, did Itachi not answer a single phone call.

"Fuck you too, dude." He said, sliding his phone into his pocket. He thought about calling Sasuke's parents but wondered if they would even pick up the phone if he called. They still had a house phone and he didn't know they personal cell numbers because he never needed to.

He was basically jogging down the road, frantic to get home as soon as he could.

Naruto pulled his phone out again-he tried calling the unknown number, but it just rang into infinity. He couldn't even leave a message, which meant Sasuke's coworkers couldn't even tell Naruto where Sasuke was. He took a shallow breath-his chest starting to ache. He wasn't sure, but he felt like he was going to throw up. Sweat started to bead up on his forehead and for the first time, in all of his panic, Naruto noticed there was a car following him.

He slowed to a near stop and the car pulled into a vacant parking lot next to him-not even close enough to be near a street lamp. "Oh, just what I need." Naruto muttered.

He re-dialed Itachi's number, taking peeks over his shoulders every so often to make sure no one was following him. The last thing he needed was someone to find out where he lived. He pulled up his hood a little more around his face-it was still dumping, and the roads were slick with run-off. He could hear the rain rushing into the storm drains but no footsteps behind him.

"Pick up your phone, you piece of shit!" Naruto growled into the receiver. The car had started moving again, pulling up to the red light at the section Naruto was about to cross. The light was still red and Naruto was about to run across the road, when he felt something quickly impact him from the side. His phone shot out of his hand and as soon as he realized he was lying on the ground, someone standing over him. He could feel a coldness sinking into him-his vision was going white at the edges and little dots danced in his eyes.
-

Naruto woke with a searing pain in his temple and an even worse one on his left side. He coughed, once and the air coming back into his lungs stung. His head was woozy, he could barely keep focused on where he was. There were two voices speaking faintly in the distance-but it seemed like how it was on TV, he could hear everything they were saying, but nothing was making its way through.

His eyes rolled in his head and he laid his head back down against whatever he was laying on. It was damp, cold. The lower half of his body was throbbing, so badly. When he shifted slightly, he felt something wet between his legs-his eyes rolled again, nausea filling up his stomach. He turned his head to the side and retched.

When he re-opened his eyes, there was a man standing above him. Face completely blank-he just stared at Naruto. Dark eyes openly showing…Nothing at all. The blond erupted into goose bumps, all of his senses telling him something was, very, very wrong. "Why are you here?"

There was no response, and the man turned away from Naruto-then. The blond felt the returning feeling from earlier. Panic. There was a base sickness that crept even more into his stomach. His hands were shaking, but because they were locked down to this table, he couldn't even move them. He let out a worried whimper, trying to close his eyes and block this out.

This was a nightmare.

That car had hit him and he was in shock-this wasn't real.

"Why are you doing this?" His breath had picked up, to almost hyperventilation levels. The man paused for a moment, bringing something over to the side of the table and setting it down. Naruto could feel the heat from it on the side of his face-he couldn't turn his head to look at it, however.

"Don't take this personally." The man said casually. "I just can't take it anymore-hope you understand."

"Hope I understand?" Naruto echoed-his eyes had begun to fill with tears. Even through the blurred vision of his tears, Naruto could see the hot embers falling off a piece of wood being held in front of his face. The embers casually dropped and sparkled down, around his face and he had to close his eyes to avoid them.

"That won't do." The man said and before Naruto knew it, the wood was being shoved into his left eye, burning as every inch penetrated his skin and through the viscous bulb of his eye. Naruto couldn't scream loud enough as the pain ricocheted through his body, tearing up his back and causing him to vomit. He shook against his binding-still screaming. He couldn't move, he couldn't make enough noise. And the man next to him just watched-saying nothing. He just continued, unwavering.

The second one was placed in his right eye-the blond, however, had made the mistake this time of keeping his eye open. It was mostly out of shock, but when he felt his eyeball straight up burst from the stabbing and all the watery ooze leak onto his face, his entire world spun. He vomited again, not even being able to scream as his body rocked, and rocked. It felt like he was convulsing-his head pitifully smacked against the surface underneath him.

Shikamaru stared, as Sasuke walked up to the register. He looked just fine-no sign of injury at all. Choji was walking by with a box of assorted donuts for the display in the front; he dropped the box as the Uchiha walked by him. Sasuke placed an extra large coffee down and just stared back at Shikamaru. "Do I have something on my face?"

"Wh-I mean," Shikamaru was stuttering over his words and Sasuke tossed him two dollars for the coffee.

"Where's Naruto, anyway? He said he didn't want a ride home, but I got enough of a nap, so he can shove it."

"You're not injured." Shikamaru's inquiry also doubled as an observation.

"Yeah?"

"But-"

Sasuke raised an eyebrow, bringing the coffee up to his lips. "Why would I be injured?"

Shikamaru just stared, dumbfounded for another few seconds before he finally could fully meet Sasuke's gaze. "We got a call last night-guy said he was from your work and that you'd been in an accident. Naruto left around three something to go back to your apartment."

Sasuke felt like he swallowed a bundle of hot rocks. "Naruto isn't at our apartment." He said each word slowly-deliberately. "I got home around four-and he wasn't there." Shikamaru just stared at Sasuke even more, "Where the fuck is Naruto, Shikamaru?"
-

Itachi's constant companion was vodka.

The switch from Vice to Homicide hadn't been as smooth as Itachi had expected. Rolling over on his side, he felt his stomach slosh. He had pushed it last night after waking from a particularly bad nightmare-one from his past. He took a deep breath, blinking-blinking some more and feeling like the world was spinning around him. He heard his phone spring to life, bringing Itachi back to his reality.

"What?" He barked into the phone-his head started pounding.

"Don't fucking 'what' me!" Itachi stared up at the ceiling.

"And what crawled up your fucking ass this morning, brother?"

"ARE YOU SERIOUS?" The older Uchiha rolled to his side and finally got out of his bed, knocking the vodka bottle over as he walked past it. "I've called you fifty fucking times!" Itachi pulled the phone away from his face and he had forty seven missed calls from Sasuke and about ten from Naruto.

"You gunna tell me why or are you gunna just keep yelling at me?"

"MAYBE YOU SHOULD ANSWER YOUR FUCKING PHONE WHEN I CALL YOU!"

"If this is gunna be the way you fucking announce your engagement to me, I'm going to literally burn the church down at your wedding"

"Engagement? What the fuck are you talking about?" Itachi walked to his kitchen and grabbed a cold bottle of water from the fridge.

"Well, Naruto called me ten times, too. So…" There was a long pause.

"Do you really think I would call THAT much for an engagement? Are you so off your ass that you can't see a fucking emergency-god, you're su-"

"Don't finish that sentence." Itachi's voice held a lot of hostility. "You tell me, now, what is going on. I'm not a goddamn mind-reader. Did something happen to dad?"

"No," Itachi put down the water bottle. "Naruto is fucking missing."

"Missing?" Itachi looked back at his phone and looked at just when the last call had come from Naruto. It was about three thirty in the morning. He had several voicemails. "Are you at your apartment? I'll be over in forty."

"Okay." Without the exasperation and anger, Sasuke's voice was breaking over the line. Itachi's heart felt a pulse of pain-Sasuke was one of the only people he felt empathy for; he hurt, Itachi hurt.

Itachi put his phone down on the counter, taking a steadying breath. This was not how he wanted to spend his day off-it was bad enough he could have to come into work at a moment's notice, but now there was this issue. He shook his head.

Heading back towards the bathroom, Itachi started to strip. He would clean up everything later, for now he needed to get the scent of alcohol out of his skin. He turned the water on cold, to help him wake up even faster-sober him up even more. He also needed this time to really think-Naruto hadn't been missing yet for twenty-four hours, Sasuke couldn't go to the police yet.

They would just tell him not enough time had passed-which was likely why Sasuke had called him in the first place. The police couldn't do anything quite yet; Naruto wasn't a child. Itachi turned off the water, his skin red and numb as he squeezed the excess moisture out of his hair.

He was going to have to prepare Sasuke for this…

Itachi didn't even have to knock when he got to Sasuke's apartment. His brother was sitting on the couch next to the door, phone against his hear. The door wasn't even locked. Itachi took a passing glance around the room and saw another man standing in the corner, looking tired-bored even. Sasuke, however, was shaking softly. His body was probably on overdrive and the adrenaline kept hitting him in waves-anxiety was a true bitch.

Sasuke stood up as soon as Itachi closed the door behind him. While he started to unbutton his jacket, Sasuke started to fire off, "Took you long enough to get here."

"You should be so lucky that I even showed up. Today's my day off and yet, I still get called in for police work." Itachi placed his jacket onto one of the hooks by the front door. He crossed his arms, staring at Sasuke's face. "So, you gunna tell me everything?"

And Sasuke did-and the other man, Shikamaru, as he learned, filled in a bit of the gaps. The phone call, Naruto leaving, Sasuke's arrival, and then the realization Naruto was gone. Itachi was stone-faced and quiet as he listened, trying to take in every detail so that the investigation would go smoothly for him. But of course, this was going to be the difficult part-Itachi knew, where the questions asked were going to become biting.

"Have either of you been sleeping with someone else?" Sasuke was silent for a moment-blinking, staring at Itachi's face as if he had sprouted a second head.

"What?"

"It's a legitimate question, Sasuke." Itachi countered before his brother could enter a tirade.

"No, we haven't been sleeping with anyone else."

"Are you sure?" Itachi knew the look he was giving Sasuke wasn't one of reassurance-probably a bit too condescending for the younger's taste because his face started to blossom red, anger filing up his expression.

"Are you assuming I don't know my boyfriend? The man I've been with for almost five fucking years?" Sasuke slammed his hands down at his sides, balling them into fists. Itachi thought for a brief moment Sasuke may attempt to strike him.

Itachi put up a single finger, in warning. His expression changed-already aggravated as it was, but now his brother's moods putting him out even farther. "Don't." Itachi hissed, barely louder than a whisper. "I'm doing you the favor-the police will ask you the same questions and worse. Your attitude is not going tot get you anywhere and it will put you on the suspect list until they can prove your alibi, got it?" Itachi moved closer so that he was chest to chest with Sasuke. "Sit down."

"Could this potentially be some kind of stalker?" Shikamaru finally spoke up-obviously trying to deflect some of the tension. The room was already getting too hot.

"Anything is possible." Itachi mused, with a shrug. "The police are going to need phone records, camera footage-perhaps tracking through GPS and Naruto's own phone. If you've checked the area where he should be and he didn't turn up, it is very possible he got abducted or ran away."

"He wouldn't do something like that." Sasuke muttered softly.

Itachi sunk down so he was crouching in front of where Sasuke sat on the couch-he touched his brother's hand in solidarity. "You never really know someone-love or not. Look how many people end up married to serial killers or rapists: some people can hide what's inside better than others."

"He's not sleeping with anyone else." Sasuke said, flatly. Wells of tears were starting to form in his eyes as he looked at the floor, not able to meet Itachi's gaze.

"Are you sleeping with someone else?" Itachi asked, gently.

"As if I have time for an affair," Sasuke said with a weak laugh. "Between work and school? I barely have time to shower every day."

"What about someone stalking you? Maybe someone who's had their eye on you? Has Naruto mentioned anything about someone showing up at his work? Watching him?"

"There's a weird guy who's been coming in a lot lately." Shikamaru said, and Itachi straightened up, putting his heated glance on the other man. "He's always coming in on our shift, I asked the morning crew." Shikamaru leaned against the wall a little more, obviously feeling a little more uncomfortable. "He and Naruto had a spat a few days ago-and ever since then, he comes in around the same time, maybe an hour off some days-only goes over to him."

"If he comes into your work tonight, get his name, if you can. Last name would be even more helpful." Itachi rubbed the space between his eyes. "Go home, for now. We still have nearly eighteen hours before we can even report Naruto missing, so get some rest. He may still show up."

"I'll call you," Sasuke said weakly.

Shikamaru paused before exiting, taking a step back and placing a hand on Sasuke shoulder. "He'll come back, Sasuke."

"Yeah." The younger Uchiha replied, obviously holding back tears. "Thanks." Shikamaru patted him once, awkwardly before closing the door behind him. Itachi was looking down at his brother, heart started to thaw from the saddened look in his eyes.

"I'll find him, Sasuke." He nodded, limply, not even looking at his brother. Itachi sat down next to his brother on the couch, pulling Sasuke into a gentle hug. With all of his anger and passion subdued, Sasuke was exhausted. "It's okay, don't cry." He could feel the warmth of Sasuke's tears soaking into his t-shirt and Itachi closed his eyes, trying to calm himself. These next few days were going to be very difficult.