Disclaimer: Don't own, don't care, I'm still writing this yaoi. Yay for all the fangirls of yaoi, lol. Thanks for sticking with me, I'm hoping not to draw this out for too much longer.

Yet…

By: Apherion

Chapter 6: Strategy

Woken by a sudden noise, Itachi sat up. He knew he would have to go back to the camp, to face the others. Planning what he'd do, Itachi shook the blond that lay beside him.

"Naruto," he whispered, lacing his words with honey. The blond looked up at him, staring at him with squinted eyes, the sun blinding him. Itachi embraced him tightly, receiving lips getting pressed against his neck in turn.

"Ita-kun," the blond whispered so softly. Itachi pulled away, lightly brushing his lips against the blonde's forehead.

"Take care of your self," Itachi said coldly, picking up his clothes and donning them. He heard Naruto's sharp intake of breath, and he turned to look at the kyuubi. Mistake number four hundred seventy-eight, Itachi mentally calculated.

Naruto's eyes were no longer squinting at him. The oceanic eyes stared frightened at him; hurt echoing through the tears forming quickly there. However, the blond dressed himself quickly and stood beside him.

"I'll take care of you too!" Naruto cried, embracing him tightly. Itachi stared and watched the blond crying on him.

"Funny," Itachi said, "that from the day I had learned your name, mistakes on my part have been adding and adding, cumulative risks you and I have become." He knew he shouldn't have said it and he wanted to take the words back, but there was no going back from the truth. Naruto was expected to be in custody of Orochimaru and Itachi…

"That…that may be so…but…" Naruto choked, trying to grasp something to keep him there, if only for a little while longer.

"No, Naruto, you were supposed to be dead a long time ago! Sasuke should've killed you…and now you're here, with me. My weakness, a weakness I cannot have." Naruto held on tighter at this, shaking from his tears.

"Ita-kun…" the blond sobbed. "We can run…we can go…they'll never…find us…if we…just try…" Itachi shut his eyes tightly, turning his head away from the blond holding him.

"Naruto," Itachi ground out. "I have to go back! You…me…we can't exist as long as they know. And your friends, they still haven't found you. I'm surprised that they haven't already." Naruto let him go then.

"Itachi…" he said, breathing staggered. Itachi looked at him, the boy having said his full name. Itachi kissed the boy's lips once more. The boy sobbed, but returned it nevertheless.

"Naruto, know that I will never abandon you. Know that I'll never leave you for anything in this entire world, but you have to trust me when I say I have to go back to camp." Itachi said it strongly, his lips brushing the blonde's as he spoke. Naruto immediately responded, kissing Itachi passionately…desperately.

Thrown off guard, Itachi took hold of the situation, matching and surpassing the blonde's force doubly. He caught himself before everything went too far and he would never go back.

"Naruto," Itachi whispered as though very tried at the moment. "Naruto…I need you to do this. Don't interrupt, don't argue, just do it…please do what I ask." Itachi wasn't looking, but he knew Naruto was watching him with rapt attention.

"Now, you are to go back to Konoha, alert whoever the hokage is that you are fine that you somehow managed to get away—invent any story that comes to mind. Say you somehow figured out how to control kyuubi and you used it against us. Tell them you killed me"—Naruto's intake of breath cut across him.

"No! Why would I say that?" Itachi glared at the boy and gripped him by the shoulders.

"Naruto, listen to me," Itachi was on the verge of yelling. Impatience wearing his tolerance level into the negatives. "To Konoha, we are enemies. I hold a high enmity against Konoha as do they. If you tell them you killed me, then I would be an unknown to them." Confusion still lingered in the boy's eyes, staring intently into his.

"But I still don't understand…why say you're dead?" Itachi didn't laugh, but he loosened his grip on the boy and held him to him, embracing him tightly, for hopes the contact of their bodies touching would remain.

"Naruto," his voice like velvet sent shivers coursing through the one he held not only physically, but soulfully—deep in his heart—as well. "If I can get away from being alive, then you can too." He sighed, knowing that he'd have to tell him. He didn't want the protesting that would come up after this. "I'll fight them, the Akatsuki."

"I will fight with you." The blond stated as if he wasn't going to change his mind and Itachi wasn't going to tell him otherwise. He needed the boy if his plan was going to work. He wished he didn't.

"You will," Itachi said, hating that the boy would have to fight because the strategy could still go terribly wrong, "after going to Konoha. You cannot bring anyone with you." The plan mainly depended on the fight. If it all goes the way it should—cutting down members of the Akatsuki will be easy—they would be able to be together without the worries of ninja life or being found out.

"But"—Itachi kissed him gently and then a little more fiercely. Naruto's fingers wound in Itachi's hair tightly. Naruto, we will go where they don't know us, where they can't find us, and we will live. The vow echoed through his head as he spoke his next words.

"I know you can do that simple of a thing. Konoha's to the east and we're not very far from its gates." Itachi's eyes widened, once more caught off guard when Naruto pulled him closer into his body, pressing into his hips. Electricity flowed through him when Naruto caressed his arms. His shock didn't take long to evaporate before becoming lust.

"Before you and I leave…" and without waiting for Naruto to finish his suggestion, Itachi had already pulled off his shirt and was unbuttoning his shorts.

TBC...