"Normal speech"

Thoughts/Sound Effects/Emphasis of words

"Flashback dialogue/Japanese/French/Emphasis of words (speech)"

"Demon speak"

Inner Sakura

Seasons Don't Fear

Chapter Two:

Dance with the Devil in the Pale Moonlight

Naruto drove the blade home.

And hell broke loose.

Kyuubi no Kitsune, most powerful demon in all of the elemental nations, immortal spirit of nature's wrath, and the last tailed demon free of the Akatsuki, was making his last stand.

Unfortunately for him, so was Naruto Uzumaki.

For the better part of two decades a boy and a demon had been trapped in a cold war for their very existences. It had now escalated to an outright battle.

At first the fox, torpid and weak from the spiritual equivalent of bedsores, merely attempted to push his chakra through the bars of his cage. He assumed that his host was merely in battle, and only bothered to take in interest in the human's affairs if there was the chance of either their death or mass carnage. He was disturbed to find that the seal was being actively reinforced by his host's will.

With a potentially fatal stab wound.

The conclusion the ageless vulpine mind reached was not one that agreed with it.

"Like hell you will!!

Outside, a knife buried within his intestines, his hands clenched around the handle, Naruto was putting out the titanic effort to ignore the fact that he had just begun to bleed from a number of vital organs and simultaneously hold back his inner demon. As is easily imaginable, this was not easily done. Even his frankly hyperbolic willpower was gradually waning. He could fee the beast winning, as his control slipped little by little.

"Sasuke. Now. There's not. Much time." Naruto grunted out with each breath against the slicing pain that came with both expansion and contraction. And his control weakened.

Slowly at first, then more and more rapidly yokai began bleeding through the seal and enshrouding the teenage ninja, as light and inconsistent as fire burning spider web. Sasuke, knowing that he had less than seconds, brought the blade down on its terminal path.

A scant instant before the bladewould make contact with Naruto's neck and nick his spine; the blade was reflected by the most delicate yet deliberate flair of vermillion energy from the web covering his body. And before Sasukecould recover from the being unbalanced by recoil and surprise, he was bodily thrown from his feet by a massivefluid swell of burning energy. His body described a backward arc through the air. With his feet overtaking his head at the zenith, he recovered his presence of mind enough to drivehis blade into the bedrock upon landing to ground himself. That probably saved him from being dashed upon the canyon walls.

The flaring energy from the man he meant to kill moments before was still pouring out, now in the shape of a lotus blossom, with a wide spread of burning air spreading along the ground, and ever smaller streams piling upon that, all rising into the sky and defusing at the tips. Closer to the core of this burning blossom, a kneeling figure could be made out, obscured to a blur by a deeper red aura, with a single tail waving in a wind only it noticed. The Uchiha activated his sharingan to better see what was happening to the body within, all unwilling. Eyes burned red and slitted, sharp-clawed hands, growing fangs, a volcanic temper, and the permanent marks of the beast deepening. This was not good.

The animal had rattled the bars of its cage. And the second tail could already be seen drawing substance from the surrounding inferno.

When he felt his ability to stop the flow of demonic energy fail, Naruto resolved to do the next best thing. Rallying his will, Naruto entered the world within himself for once neither desperate nor afraid.

And far from supplicant.

With yokai still flowing into the avatar of his will within this place, he rushed back along its path, forcing more though than even the Kyuubi had intended. Though he knew the way well by now, and dashed along even the metaphorical waters within the channels, he did not even slow at the doorway to the well of his life force. Instead he crashed through the doors into chamber, crossing the room in barely enough time to even execute his idea to draw a kunai. He darted between the bars, blade ready.

I'm coming for you, you flea-bitten bastard!

Even at the cost of his soul, he would finish this day's task. Others had done the same, how could he do less for those he loved.

The fox interrupted his flight with one massivepaw, spiking him to the floor. While the massive animal pounded impossibly quickly to pin Naruto (or at least the resulting paste), his target had formed a rasengan, or its equivalent, and brought it to bear upon his attacker with both hands to defend while still prone upon the floor.

The valley of the end trembled with the force of the doomsday struggle within the teenager. Naruto's body had rolled limply forward, breathing heavily and digging his claws into the ground as if being pulled at from the heavens. The kunai was pushed gradually out of his abdomen as if drawn from a tight sheath, his blood the blade's oil. As the third tail of the demon fox formed from the crux of the other two and the aura thickened, the would-be tanto clattered upon the ground. The three feral appendages lashed at the earth around the demon vessel, catching the storm winds from the battling souls. Where they smote the earth, it sent up a myriad of shattered stones which the incessant force of the fox's rage threw outward at such speed and force to embed them like shuriken into whatever they should hit.

Sasuke was so consumed by dodging the legion of projectiles generated by the tails' seizures and so slowed by the unending wellspring of opposing force, that he was able to make only slow progress toward his target. Dammit, I shouldn't have let my guard down. I don't even have enough time to- whoa!Sasuke began to think, before a shard of granite nearly pierced his temple and he had refocused upon dodging. As it was he had several minor punctures from pebbles and grains of sand even his three tomoe Sharingan couldn't see coming. His deadly Kusanagi was barley useful for deflecting projectiles at this speed and saturation.

For the time being, Naruto was on his own.

The kyuubi pressed himself against the whirling, slicing maelstrom of energy that was shredding at his right forepawas he used it to drive the mortal into the foundations.

"Damn you, you worthless fox!" Naruto yelled from the indention he was creating under the fox's pressure, "You took every thing from me before I could do a damned thing about it! My family, my life, my future, everything! And now you even want my right to die to protect those precious to me! If you thing I'm going to let you take this last thing from me, your dead wrong! I will keep this promise; I will protect them with my life! This is my life, my body, my soul and you will never beat me! If you think different, then you don't know Naruto Uzumaki!!"

With that he pushed the Rasengan with inhuman strength, driving the behemoth of off him and throwing it like a rag doll into the shadows of the cage. As Naruto pushed his battered form to its feet, his right arm a hanging mangle mass from his last assault, he became conscious of the yokai slowing to a trickle in his material body. Limping toward the edge of the cage and pondering the possible meanings of the demon's defeat proved enough of a distraction for the massive vulpine to inch its bulk silently behind him.

He heard the light sound of padded feet leaving the ground only instants before darkness took him. Naruto had been enveloped by the beast jaws before he could even scream.

With the demonic winds of fury and the hail of stones abating at last, Sasuke raced the too long gap between where he had been forced back to and his target. He had to end this quickly, and thus flashed through one handed seals with his left while he ran, his sword held back so the point trained on Naruto like a spear. His former team mate looked exhausted, hunched upon hands and knees like a beaten animal. His demonic aura and tails were being slowly diffused to nothingness around him.

Naruto, whatever you did in there worked. Now I can finish this!

He was maybe two arm spans and less than a second away, his blade already crackling with the not quite lighting heralded by one thousand birds, when the red flow returned. He barely had time to shift the blade to guard against a stray tail, resurrected, which his momentum didn't give him the opportunity to dodge. As he sailed through the air he struggled to remain calm, and managed to plant his feet upon the stone wall he might have been thrashed against.

"I just have to stay focused. I've driven back the demon before. I just need to meet his eyes." He said out loud, quietly conferring with himself. But, as he saw two tails join their three siblings he was far from convinced. As he pushed off the wall, using chakra to curve his path through the sky, better to catch the possessed boy's eye, one question remained.

What happened to Naruto in there?

Even within the smothering dark of the demon's belly, Naruto could feel the changes racking his flesh. Though blind, some sick gnosisgranted because of or in spite of the demon's will kept him well apprised of his physical form. Muscle and ligament tore from bone. His claws drove into his finger and toe bones, forming wicked calcified boney growths armoring each digit. Burns flowed and pulsed along his shredded flesh only to instantly heal. In their wake, springing up like grasses after a passing wind, patches coarse orange fir. Blood driven through his skin in a thousand orifices splattered against the burning red aura and thus became animate, giving the feral immaterial form more credence.

He could hear the hoarse screams coming from his throat, though he could feel that ruined and healing from the fumes of his own burning tissues.

Unmercifully he was still lucid enough to ask a question. His pain gave it wings beyond even the kyuubi no kitsune's power to control.

"Am I in Hell?" He whimpered, and even his agony was momentarily silent.

Sasukecircumvented the beast, his path dozens of meters above him. He had to catch its eyes. Otherwise he might not be able to stop it. He was convinced that the demon had wrested control of the flesh from Narutocompletely. And he had no idea if he could match the beast's strength, even with only five tails manifesting.

"Am I in Hell?" The half canine form cried in a voice smaller than Sasuke had ever heard come from Naruto. Suddenly released from the pain of transformation, he opened his tearing slitted crimson eyes.

Seizing the opportunity, Sasuke changed course and dove to ground. Landing at a distance he hoped would give him enough time to react if things went badly; he crouched down meet Naruto's gaze.

The connection was instant, the doujutsu pulling Sasuke's consciousness into Naruto's soul. A flash of red, the sensations of pain he could scarcely imagine, and a single lucid image was all he caught before being forced out.

The image was of a massive gated set of cage doors. Ajar, they hung off of damaged hinges. The seal that bound the beast was intact but suspended over nothing, sending out electric blue crackling arcs to the doors, which twitched at each pulse in an effort to close themselves again. It looked decidedly hopeless. In the shadows of the cage, narrow glowing eyes stared, unreadable.

"Narutodoesn't live here anymore." It took him a moment to acknowledge that he had indeed heard the chilling, guttural statement in the flesh and not in his mind. The sixth tail, manifest in the scant instants he was within Naruto's mind, only confirmed what he already knew.

Fixing his attention at the whole of Naruto's half furred face again, Sasuke instantly felt the need to ready for an attack. As he activated the cursed seal, felling the bone deep burn of the shifting marks as they ignited his chakraproduction, the possessed boy gained his feet. His face gave no doubt as to who was in control. Naruto could never look so cruel.

"That's right pretty boy, get all pumped up. You've got all the time in the world." The sardonic fox spirit chuckled through his host's mouth. "We wouldn't want you to drop out of the fight too quickly."

How dare he be so calilier?

"Prepare to die!" Temporarily blinded by the rabid aggression and megalomania of the cursed seal, he shushined directly in front of Naruto, and chopped at the crux of his left shoulder and neck and belatedly saw the brashness of the action. As his kusanagientered the realm of the heart and lungs, he became aware that this was a terrible mistake. The demon was smiling. The sharp-toothed grin was an exact copy of Naruto's save for the hungry glint that shown in his eyes and from his fangs.

"My turn." Was all Sasuke could make out before he impacted the rock wall. He didn't even see himself flying the few dozens of meters to the wall, skidding upon the river for part of it if his wet cloths where any indication, much less observe the strike.

As he peeled himself from the imprint of his body within the stone, Naruto's commandeered body sauntering towards him, he took stock.

A blow to the sternum.

Several broken ribs.

Probably a concussion.

Who knows how many internal injuries.

He still had bowel control.

He could still feel his legs.

Okay, I can fight. Even his inner monologue seemed tired, but he managed to gain his feet and present a fighting stance, careful to control his breathing so he didn't puncture a lung.

"I know you can do better than that," The demon chided, still strolling idly towards him. "Even this idiot could beat you like this." he gestured to himself, then dropped his arm in disgust, "How about this? I'll give you a free shot; if you can keep your head until I decide it comes off." And he held his arms out to his sides, making no effort to defend.

Sasuke gathered his still burning chakraand slid the bladeto a stabbing position with exactitude, prepared to strike. He would thrust the kusanagi into his enemy's heart, then use the chidorisupercharged by the seal to stop it. That should give him a chance for the hormones flooding his system to repair some of the damage and numb the pain from the last exchange.

For the second time that day he rushed at Naruto, bladeready to impale him in a desperate gesture of defiance. Black lightning danced between his bladeand the air, and his eyes drawing the exact position of the heart in his mind. As he drovethe bladeto the hilt into the monster's heart, he redoubled his energy and pushed it through the blade. He felt the slight twang along the blade of Naruto's heartbeat, and felt it seize and stop as the electricity ravaged it.

Not satisfied he jumped away, already drawing deeper from the well of the seal to heal and prepare for whatever came next. Naruto's perverted form still stood. He had expected no less. It shook itself as though to clear its head of cobwebs.

"Good effort. I dare say you could give that blasted weasel a run for his money with that attack." Flames pored from the chest wound, which was rapidly sealing with furred dermis. He gave a devil-may-care lopsided grin. "Care to try again junior? It's been along time since a human was this much fun for me to fight!"

It's good to be the king.

Finally, after a decade and change (He had no idea exactly how long, kami knew how much time stretched when you were sealed) of incarceration with the only parole in sight being annihilation, he was free. Maybe he didn't have his old colossal body, but he could work on this one a little. Anatomy was largely negotiable in his experience.

But, back to the matter at hand. That simian that was going to give the coup de grace to his new body before had to go. He was a damned nuisance. God new he was obsessive enough not to let this go, so best to take him now. If he left the mortal on his own devices for too long he might end up sealed into someone else.

And it wasn't like he couldn't use a little fun while he was at it. He hadn't had anything even closeto a fair fight since he grew his final tail. The toad and the blonde had sucker punched him, no proper battle at all. This twisted little monkey could be entertaining, with the proper handicap. He would test this body against him.

All right, I have to pull out all the stops if I want to survive this.

The seal caught fire, burning as it drew power from his flesh and transformed it into raw chakra. The flame marks danced along his skin as the pyre caught them more fully as well. He could feel the oily, soul deep heat delving into him as the seal shifted his body. His bones drew chakraand fused with it for added density. His muscles drank in the tainted substance and became tighter, stronger, and more reactive. His skin, eyes, and hair changed color; tempered by the corrupting power like fire hardens green wood. He was no longer quite so mortally fragile.

And then the wings pushed out from his back. He had never adequately been able to understand where they came from, especially because his sensation-dead skin felt only the warping as the unaccountable new sinews and bones pushed out of his back from nowhere. But it felt good to have them. No one who had never actually had a pair of wings of their own flesh could truly appreciate the sense of serenity, coupled with the potential for an outpouring of predatory menace they added to every moment.

"Well, not quite as much a simian as I thought, are you ? Actually, you remind me of an oni that used to date one of my sisters, but then she was bipedal at the time." He shook his head, and to Sharingan eyes the movement was Naruto by definition."Well, fair is fair, if you get to option out of being human then so do I, Oni-san."

And he blurred, like rising air in the heat of summer. The garment he wore shredded themselves as if pulled away by thousands of hands. And where in less than the time for even a Henge Jutsu, a fox the size of a pony was looking at Sasuke, lightly glowing red. And the aether shifted, pushed out of the way as a new tail shifted into view, as if an invisibility cloak was twisted off by a squall. And the fox swelled, gradually as rising dough. He fanned his seven elegant tails behind him as he threw his massive vulpine head in exhilaration, roaring to the entire world his return. When he was done, he was the size of an ox cart.

Before his human challenger could properly adjust to his metamorphosis, the fox rushed around him, bringing himself around to the edge of the river. Before he was about to plunge in, he turned on a forepaw, whipping his tails, and sending an impossibly tall wave racing through the standing current and swamping Sasuke, drawing him into the water.

From which he immediately rose, thrusting out of the water with a flap of his wings to stand upon the middle of the river. He met the next wavean instant after he broke the surface. It was too massivefor such a small body of water, to tall for him to leap. He noted that it ran counter to the course of the river, but filled the valley like a damn had broken. Running up the swell of the wavehe set the tip of his bladebelow the surface to feel for any movement, drawing a line of turbulence in his wake. As he reached the crest of the wave, some sixty incongruous feet above the normal flow, he leapt into the air and snapped his wings out to hold his weight. Below, the crashing of the reversed current broke upon the valley floor.

Rising on the thermals created by the demonic apparition below, he spotted the fox charging him from the junction of the two statues, the origin of the tsunami. Sasuke, pin wheeling on the warm rising air, was suddenly acutely aware he had little hope of irritating this beast, much less winning this battle. He would almost certainly die.

So be it. But he was an Avenger. He would not die before his brother without a fight, least of all as close as he was to a new chance to even the score. Forming seals, quickly, he raised a chidorialong his blade. Then though t better of it, and pushed more power into the technique, and drew half the energy to his left hand to form a Raikiri in the most literal sense. Two black cracking blades were in his hands, one free, one focused upon steel.

"Chidori!" He yelled, as he stooped his wings and dove. The fox leapt at him, intent on striking its aerial enemy. Sasuke struck as they met mid air far above the canyon's walls, drawing both blades along either side of the chest toward the lungs as he slipped along the beast's underside. But as he pierced the aura and felt the sternum give, a tearing sensation, a pain beyond any normal human experience ripped at his left shoulder. His wing had been removed by the demonic jaws of the fox. As he tumbled end over end, with his single wing throwing him off balance, he began to black out.

100 meters

75 meters

50…

25…

10 meters

Five…

Damn it, he caught himself.

And the fox descended to finish the job, laughing at his tenacious prey.

Breathing heavily, bleeding from the stump of a wing, and with eyesight gradually returning from the center out, and the seal going into remission, Sasukehung at the bottom of the small gouge his sword had carved when he thrust it into the rock wall, stopping himself with just five meters to being a sticky smear.

Dropping to the ground and forgetting the blade, he brought his right arm up to try to hold the wound. Damn, I can't fight that monster like this. But I don't have any other options. The thought was desperate and inevitable once he had challenged the demon. He felt a shadow descend upon him.

He threw himself out of the way, rolling onto his uninjured shoulder, as the demon fell from above, heedless of the force of impact. Ribs and viscera dripped blood from the shredded tears, already half cauterized by the strike that made them. He still held the grey, dactyl wing in his teeth.

"You're putting up a much better fight than you little friend did. He hit harder, but never got subtle." He spoke incongruously without moving his jaws, the sinister baritone coming from nothing. "I think you deserve a reward for the performance you put in." The edges of the ravines carved into his flesh crept together, then disappeared. "I'll let you see me at full power before I kill you, so you don't have any regrets about losing. You never really had any chance, you know." He spit out the wing.

In the ten meter impact crater, the demon began once more to stream power. Sasuke, utterly exhausted, tumbled backwards at the force. Demonic energy burned the rock the fox stood upon, and the sky smelt like lightning. The sky boiled over suddenly with storm clouds, and a deathly silence gripped the land of fire.

A rain so light it became mist before it hit the ground fell, and the fox fanned its tails once again. Light suffused the suspended droplets, glowing eldritch blue from the tips of each of the seven tails, and a ruddy red from the demon's aura. Thunder rumbled overhead. The mists gathered tightly against the vulpine form, obscuring it even from the sharingan Sasuke refused to release.

Lightning struck the cloudbank, and the sharp tang of energy roamed within until resting with its seven brothers. The weather cleared as suddenly as it had stormed, all its power expended. The demon emerged from the mist like a ship at sea as it grew, its eight tails twitching violently, each looking for something to strike at besides the building sized demon itself.

Naruto felt so warm (burning). It was like dreaming. He couldn't remember anything but this warmth (why can't I?). He was covered in something like thick like mud, which shifted and pulsed with and around his body (blood). Whatever it was it flowed in and out of him in a thousand places, ignoring (piercing) the skin. He was part of this substance, one with it (subjugated by it). Parts of it flowed languid as a forest stream, others moved violently (fighting), rhythmic, shifting back and forth.

He felt next to him (within him?) a great source of heat, like a furnace. He burned if he turned (could he move?) toward it. It was getting hotter now, the energy becoming more intense (unbearable), for the first time (always) unpleasant (agony).

He was comforted (suffocated)by the closeness. It felt like love (rage) to him. He had never felt like that before (Like you know anything about love!).It was like his mother's (monster's)womb. He just wanted to forget (Remember, damn it!), let go (No! Hold on!), sink into this solitude. (No, I've already been saved from this hell once! You can't keep me here anymore!) Here was the end of his labor (life), ripe for the taking. He would be a fool to pass up this eternal peace (I'll fight you to the end of time if I have to! Believe it! You can't beat me! You will not win!).

Letting loose more and more energy, turned this time into itself, shaping the final tail from his borrowed body, He lost a measure of control of his host. No matter. He had no hope of salvation as deeply as he had been carried into the demon's very being.

He remembered the last time he gained this last tail. It was centuries ago, but he still remembers it like yesterday. The power, new again after so long gone, pouring from the infinite through him.

He became the avatar of destruction, fury made flesh. Nothing in the world could stop him, then or now.

(Except for the power of human sacrifice.)

Sasuke Uchiha, the man who finally killed Orochimaru of the Sannin, who would be the last Uchiha and their new patriarch, one of the deadliest ninja in the world, knew with no doubt at all that he was dead where he stood.

Gone was his pride, he was numb. Exhaustion and the remission of the cursed seal left him open to the apocalyptic killing intent of the kyuubi no kitsune.

Not that it would have done him much good. He was impotent facing this beast that would have been his best friend. By definition, everyone was.

There was no attack in existence that would more than annoy it. There was little chance of retreat.

With the final tail forming, and the demon growing to proportions nearly incomprehensible, Sasuke could only watch in transfixed horror as his death rapidly approached.

The fox closed his eyes, massive body no longer strained with the effort to force the redevelopment of the ninth and final tail. It was finished, but hung half limp among its energetic brethren.

The bijuu took a deep breath, and the tails calmed. Focus described itself in its features.

And the world dimmed.

Even without training to sense the life force of others you would know that something was happening. Those who could, would feel all of the chakra in the area being pulled into the kyuubi no kitsune.

Animals, plants, rocks, the river, all gave something to this beast.

The statues standing sentinel gavememories, because stone remembers. The gave the titanic massesof granit that rose through magma to be tha bones of continents, dreams of long sleep uncarved and unseen by living eyes in the depths of the land, shadows of who they were carved after so long ago, the battle between the two boys years ago that had marred them. Anything and everything the stones had seen.

The river gavethe taste of the mountains of its headwaters, the forests behind it, and the marshes at its feet. It even gave the small worrying dread of the ocean that consumes it. It bleed into the demon, flowing freely in the knowledge that it was eternal, ever regeneratied by the press of water. It could change and wither and flood, but it was eternal. Or at least it was close enogh that this small tithe could be ignored.

The trees gave the merest fraction of their centuries of life. Freely given, it was a gift to their guardian and destroyer. They knew his true nature, and did not begrudge him.

The animals gave most hesitantly, each losing some of the six billion some odd precious heartbeats each animal was given. They feared this king of beasts, but gave because it was their duty, beyond any opposition.

Sasuke gave without knowing, a tiny fraction of his soul slipped from him to the demon. Half darkened by an unholy taint, half innocent and honorable as the day his family died; it was a soul tempered to great strength, yet great vulnerability. In a word, the soul of an avenger.

(Sasuke?)

In this world, where every life and spirit channeled into a single being, the sun seemed to shine only on Naruto.

And you could see Naruto in that instant. The serene oneness of the fox in that moment allowed the boy the shine through. Startling, the similarities built up upon one another until you wondered how they were missed. His fur wasn't the burnt orange of the demon under the crimson chakra, but the honey gold of a field of wheat at sunset. His brow was the same, giving softness to the demon's features he would never have naturally. The ears weren't the long, almost rabbit-like feral things described in its aura, but stiff, triangular, and a little large for the head, like a desert fox from Kaze no Kuni. Even the rangy limbs of the beast shouted in some indefinable way that they were Naruto.

It took all of a second for Sasuke to see this and take hope as he crouched, leaning upon a boulder for cover some hundred meters away. Then the demon regained himself, and poised to kill his human adversary. This time Sasuke was literally thrust to the ground by the force of his malice.

The demon approached slowly, as if hoping to savor this first death among uncountable others. Sasuke was prostrate upon the ground. He had nothing left.

And he finally came to understand something about Naruto he never truly considered before. He was born into the world and immediately cursed with a demon inside him, waiting for the day its unimaginable fury would again be free. He was hated because of this before he could even speak. He was alone in every way that matters for most of his life. He was in a trial by fire almost from the womb.

Any child who could withstand that for his twelve formative years with no idea as to why with his sanity, would never be normal.

He no longer had the right to weakness the moment he learned of the beast, and turned away from it.

He no longer had the right to be afraid, with this sort of monster waiting to consume his soul.

He no longer had the luxury of being just another face in the crowd. He had to be special, extraordinary, the best. Because if he was anything less he would fail and the beast would consume his soul. And the world as he knew it would end.

Naruto Uzumaki was doomed to be a hero on the day of his birth, and wouldn't have it any other way.

Because he cared about people. He had so much hate and ignorance thrown at him as a child he loved anyone who saw him as something worthwhile with a fierceness that defied reason. If you become precious to him, he will giveanything to protect you. Maybe give everything. And Sasuke wondered who he came here today for. What was so important that Naruto would throw his life, all the promises he made, and any hope of protecting those he cared about away.

What if he came here for me?

What if there is something he needs to die just to protect?

What if this is what he was trying to prevent?

In that instant, that epiphany, Naruto Uzumaki became to Sasuke Uchiha, his greatest rival, what he had been to many before.

A source of strength.

An inspiration.

The spark that ignites the will of fire

His hero.

And Sasuke would not, could not, allow Naruto to fail like this. He would not allow him to be devoured by the demon it was his first and most sacred duty to guard. He would not see him as a soulless force of destruction.

Sasukewould save him at all costs. Naruto would do no less.

Beaten, bloody, edging ever closer to death, he stood. Under the most powerful killing intent in the world he kept his composure. Under a demon's regard he spoke.

"Naruto," he started, speaking clearly and loudly so the beast could hear, "I think I understand why you called me here this mourning, and why you wish to end your life. What I believe is that someone precious to you would be better off with you dead. I don't know, and have no need to. But it is important that this is the path you have chose... or maybe had chosen for you. The path of sacrifice for those you love."

His voice hitched, at this, but after a moment he continued. The demon looked as though he wished to interrupt, to kill him, but was unable to do so. Like he was being held back by something.

"But Naruto, look at yourself. This is not you. This…animal, this demon, will destroy everything, everyone you care about. You have fought him so hard, for so long. Now he has beaten you, when you were closest to defeating him permanently. But even that is not important now. Only one thing is. If we allow this demon out of this valley, it will almost certainly destroy the village. Everyone there will almost certainly die. And worse, those who love you will die knowing that you allowed it to happen. Or else some newborn will have to bear this burden again."

"Naruto, you are stronger than anyone else I've ever known, to hold this back for so long. Stronger than I could ever hope to be. But you need to be strong just once more. For Konohagakure. For everything you ever believed in. For those who believein you. For me." He paused, unsure if even as desperate as he was now, using her name even to save Naruto was wise. "For Sakura."

"Show us how strong you are. Show us how strong we can be too. Because if you can't save yourself, if your own survival doesn't matter, don't let this happen to us. Lend us you strength, your hope. Give us the will of fire that burns within you."

Sasuke got down on his knees, awkwardly due to his injuries. He placed his hands before him on the ground, and pressed his forehead in the dirt. He prostrated himself before both the demon and the boy.

"Please Naruto, save us."

And Naruto heard him. Devoured by a demon and lost within its soul, he heard. And he found the will to fight his demon.

Not with fists, or chakra, or even a battle of wills.

He merely felt the raging beast within himself and around himself.

He felt the demon, over a thousand years old, capable of destroying nations. And he simply denied it the liberties it had taken.

He took back his mind and left the beast his cage.

He took back his body and the demon flesh collapsed into a skin husk and cinders, leaving him prone in the ashes.

He took back his future, and then gave it up for good.

As the ashes of demon flesh were spread by the wind, Naruto regained his feet shakily. The pelt, shrinking steadily as it lost the energy from the fox, was still large enough to cover him twice over. It looked contained only the thick over fur of the fox, the thinner underbelly already down to nothing.

"I'll be dammed before I commit seppuku in the nude." He said derisive, if exhausted, as he arranged the pelt's head over his right shoulder, its left foreleg over his left, and the rear legs tied together as an improvised kilt. The tails dragged in the dirt.

"Sorry about that, he won't interrupt again." Naruto said tiredly, as he walked toward the river. He stopped only once before the middle of the flowing mass, retrieving the kunai he had plunged into himself earlier from beneath some rubble.

He knelt upon the center of the river, knife ready in both hands.

"I'll return to the village soon" Sasuke said slightly behind him.

"Good. Like I said before they'll need someone to look after them now, someone to keep the monsters at bay," His chuckle was deep and rueful in his chest "Even if he is more than a bit of a monster himself."

"And Sasuke," he caught his rival's eyes over his shoulder, "Thank you, for everything."

For the second time that day Naruto Uzumaki committed hara-kiri. With the demon once again bound he bled freely. His entrails shredded by the twice blooded bladedid not heal, and he slowly died while his comradestood watch, blade once again at the ready. When he thought Narutowould approve, not too early showing a lack of faith nor too late showing disrespect, he ended his best friend's life.

As Sasuke watched the head and body descend into the abyss below a though occurred to him. They should not find the body, here or anywhere else. They should have hope.

"Amaterasu" he called softly, not yet full believing that he had the ability. But the midnight flames arced from his mouth to the sinking body and head, trailing a ribbon of bubbles as it heated water to steam, slowly moving downriver.

As his eyes focused upon his reflection in the surface he saw his Mangekyo eyes. The tomoe had sharpened into thin crescents, and stretched so that they went from the edge of his iris to around the center point of the eye, almost touching in the center. He no longer had his normal human pupil, the center having filmed over with the iris' bright red, but as he could now see things sharper than ever before, he didn't worry about it. The over all affect, he thought, was that everything he saw was focused into that on center point of red nothingness, that they were being absorbed. Even compared to his brother's these eyes seemed powerful.

As he left along the river to avoid leaving any traces pursuers could follow possible, the crescents within his eyes idly chased one another around their nexus; he replayed the cataclysmic events of the mourning over again in his mind.

Did I really face down a demon and give it a speech He though which a stifled laugh. Naruto must have rubbed off on me.For some reason that didn't bother Sasuke as much as he thought it should have.

He decided he would keep his promises to Naruto. He would face the consequences of his defection to Orochimaru and the Sound village. He would act in his teammate's stead as guardian of the village, even to his own death. He would never let it be known how Narutodied, because he didn't deserveto be seen as a suicide in the end. And Sasuke would fulfill the promise that Naruto made to the girl he had loved until death.

But first he had to avenge his clan upon his brother. Funny, after so long a hunt suddenly that didn't seem like the burden it had before. Seeing what he had seen today, and knowing what he now did about Naruto's life, the howling ghosts of his kin no longer seemed as important or as close.

He would still kill his brother; nothing in the world would stop that, but his reasons had changed. He no longer felt the irresistible compulsion to destroy Itachi. Instead, he felt that he was simply too malicious to be allowed to live; and that it was his task to restore the Uchihas to what they were before his holocaust, human beings instead of madmen and monsters.

He supposed this new way of seeing things was Naruto's fault. He could accept that, he was the only person to have met the spastic blonde until now and come away without an epiphany, so he supposed was due. He was thankful, even, that the knot of hate wasn't choking his heart anymore.

So, yes he would keep his promises. Because Naruto had given his life to Sasuke so that he would finally havepeace. And who knew who else he was trying to save. How could Sasuke spit in the face of a person with as much power as he had seen today, and instead chose to a destiny of hardship and sacrifice for those he cared about.

Naruto deserved better than that. Sasuke would see that he got it, this last time at least. Because Sasuke Uchiha never thought of himself first, never allowed his mind to overrule what his heart knows is right, and never went back on his word. Because now, that was his nindo too.

Believe it.

Okay, first off, thank you to my reviewers, some of the comments really helped, keep them coming.

Second, did you really think that the kyuubi would go down without a fight? I mean, that is the perfect excuse for an all out brawl between Naruto and his inner demon. And I wanted to see Sasuke's arrogant ass get owned (not literally, sicko). Tell me what you think of the fight, I'm worried about my abilities in that area.

Also, next chapter we get into exposition land, but I'm hoping some re writes will make it bearable