Copyright: Take what you will from this, but I own nothing...sadly...

"You're awake."

"Where am I?"

"A warm wood-cabin donated to us by Yamato." Kakashi answered the tired and drowsy Naruto, "A heavy storm hit the area and we decided to take shelter for a day or so. Plus, you needed time to recover from your wound."

"What wound? I took out Sasuke before-" Naruto glowered as he recalled the kunai that had cut across his face when he saved Sakura from Sasuke. A kunai that Sasuke had taken from Sakura, "Oh...she poisoned it."

"At first I thought that nothing Sakura used would've worked on Sasuke thanks to Orochimaru's training. But I guess I was wrong...that mitochondrial toxin would've killed most people within moments including Sasuke." "We had to move quickly before the toxin ate away your blood cells. Sasuke's comrade owed us a debt and was rather happy to repay it."

"Guess I'll have to thank her-"

"And Sakura for administering the antidote." Kakashi added while Naruto frowned, "How does it taste?"

"My own words?" As much as he hated to admit it, Sakura had just saved his life. Even after he told her to stop helping him, "Bad milk I guess."

"You'd know all about that." Naruto couldn't believe that his sensei still remembered the bad milk incident before the team had their first exercise, "Not that I don't understand how you feel."

"Sasuke's body-"

"Sai's holding onto it." Kakashi answered, bringing up a topic that both student and sensei were not eager to reopen, "I am sorry that it had to come to that."

"He didn't leave us any other choice."

"It's easy to say that, but how do you feel?"

"Probably the same way he felt when he killed Itachi..." Naruto said, thinking back to the secret that Madara had told him before revealing the Curse of Hatred that had afflicted Sasuke, "Did I make a mistake sensei?"

"No. You've merely made a heavy decision." Kakashi answered his student, "Right or wrong, a shinobi will find themselves faced with choices that will be heavy regardless of the action taken. Even if you made the best possible choice, the consequences of that action will weigh on you. It is the ugly truth of the shinobi world."

"I gave up on him..."

"If you had given up, then you would have allowed someone else to kill him. But you took the burden for yourself, just like the Shodai Hokage did against Madara...like I had done with Obito." Naruto's attention perked up upon mention of the first hokage and a name that Naruto had briefly seen on the Konoha Memorial Stone, "They were friends once...but when Madara betrayed the village, Senju Hashirama was left with no choice but to fight him. What you did with Sasuke is no different."

"Except...Sasuke's really dead..." Naruto muttered with wet eyes that were already beginning to leak, "Whose Obito? Is he the guy you always visit at the Memorial?"

"He was my squadmate under the Yondaime...your father." Naruto still had to get used to that idea. His father was the Yondaime Hokage and Kakashi had learned under him. It was a warm kind of strange, but warm nonetheless, "On my first mission as a jonin, I made a terrible call and our medical teammate Rin was captured. I wanted to continue with the mission, but Obito insisted on going after her and we split up. I changed my mind and got there in time to help Obito and lost my eye for my tardiness."

"So that sharingan is..."

"Obito's.." Kakashi heavily confirmed, "After we saved Rin, our enemy triggered an avalanche...since I was missing an eye, I was nearly crushed. But Obito saved me and was crushed under a large boulder...it was a miracle that he was even alive to speak. We tried to save him, but there wasn't enough time...I still remember all of the blood that was leaking out from under that rock..."

"So he gave you his sharingan to help you escape." Kakashi nodded to Naruto's guess and another question began to form in his mind, "What happened to Rin?"

"I killed her..." Kakashi answered to Naruto's complete and utter shock, "Now you understand why I wanted to kill Sasuke in your place? I've already carried the burden of a comrade's death since before you were born..."

"What happened?"

"I didn't have a choice in the matter. A few months later, Rin and I were part of a taskforce sent to investigate a command post in the Land of Water that hadn't been reported back when they were supposed to. When we got there, we found our comrades safe and decided to rest before leaving. Unfortunately, those comrades were actually Kiri Anbu who had disguised themselves as Konoha shinobi and completely took us by surprise at night. Out of the forty of us...only eight got out that attack alive and in one piece."

"And Rin?"

"Somewhat of a tragic pattern...I had overused my sharingan while fighting the Kiri ANBU and nearly collapsed from chakra exhaustion. Rin restored my chakra at the cost of her own and used a genjutsu to force me to leave her." Kakashi recalled as a tear flowed from both of his eyes, "When the survivors regrouped, the genjutsu was dispelled and I immediately wanted to save Rin. When everyone else made it clear that they were going to return to the village, I left to help Rin on my own."

"Tracking her was easy...in fact, it was too easy. But I didn't care, all that mattered was saving Rin." The Copy Cat Jonin used a thumb to wipe a tear from his right eye before he continued, "When I finally found her, she was begging me to kill her. She said that the Kiri Anbu wanted to use her to destroy Konoha. I refused and tore through any Kiri Anbu that stood in my way. We made our way to a swamp and an ANBU shot Rin in the back with a crossbow. It enraged me...so I charged a Raikiri and darted at him..."

Naruto said nothing though what came next was easy enough to guess.

"She leapt into my path...it was too late to stop." Kakashi's right arm tightened as if constricted by a shackle, "Obito's sharigan began to act up and the last thing that I saw were the Kiri ANBU standing over me as if the air around them was beginning to distort..When I woke up, I was lying next to Rin's body surrounded by mangled and twisted pieces of meat that used to be people. Guy and your father arrived just as my mind fractured...my arm still caked in Rin's blood...blood flowing from the sharingan."

"Is that when it became a Mangkeyo?"

"Yeah...but it wasn't until recently that I ever felt right about using it." Kakashi explained and exhaled through his mask, "The burden of my comrade's deaths still haunt me to this day...even knowing what happened, happened the way that it had to happen. What you're feeling now, is the burden of choice...the burden of a shinobi."

"And I thought I was done with luggage."

"It gets easier with time...as you become stronger..." Kakashi assured Naruto, "You're already much stronger than me...as unfair as your life has been, I may have cracked a long time ago. The Kyubi, Akatsuki, The War, Sasuke..."

"Sakura..."

"Her actions may seem hopelessly stupid, but she was trying to do the best that she could...she's always struggled with how to do it." Seeing that Naruto was unconvinced, Kakashi figured that now wasn't a good time to try and act as mediator between Naruto and Sakura, at least overtly, "I'm not excusing what she did, but she does care you. Just try to listen to her, try to see things from her perspective."

"Once she figures out what that perspective is...I'm all ears."

"Alright, I'll leave you to rest."

xxxxxxxxxx

"He's going to be okay." Kakashi reported to the waiting members of the Konoha 12, plus Yamato and the stowaway Konohamaru, "The antidote has gotten him out of the worst of the danger. But he still needs plenty of rest."

"I'm glad Naruto-kun is alright..."

"Troublesome..." Shikamaru muttered though he was clearly relieved to hear of Naruto's well-being, "And it doesn't look like the storm will let up for a few days."

"It's not an ordinary storm." Shino remarked, standing near a window where the torrential rain could be seen pouring down on nature outside, "None of my Kikaichu have managed to survive in the open rain. It's laced with chakra."

"He's right." Neji confirmed, his eyes strained from how often he had used his clan's technique, "Every drop of rain has chakra within it and it's heavy with it."

"What kind of jutsu is this?"

"It's not a jutsu..." Kiba answered Lee, "The Land of Iron's located right in between all five shinobi nations. The weather on the borderlands is supposed to be all over the place and that's why it's raining."

"What Kiba means is that the Land of Iron has had the lands close to it's borders in constant weather flux." Kakashi clarified, "No one is sure why, but legend has it that a fight broke out between the Kages when they met during the First Ninja War. As a result, each area of the land is forever altered and prone to weather made more dangerous by the leftover chakra of that clash. In addition...particularly large usages of chakra can trigger events like this at times. Which makes this a much more ideal neutral ground for negotiation between shinobi villages."

"Which means that this storm was caused by Sasuke's attack on the Summit and his battle with Danzo, Kakashi and Naruto?"

"Sparked would be a better word, if the legend is true."

"Well great job Billow-brow!" Ino sarcastically complimented the quiet Sakura, "We're stuck in the middle of a chakra-charged monsoon because you wanted to be the heroine! Thanks a lot!"

"No one asked you to be out here..."

"Leave Sakura alone, Ino...She's worried about Naruto-"

"She's the one who put him in there." Ino reminded Hinata as Sakura rubbed her forehead, "I'm surprised that you're defending her. She did try to take Naruto from you right behind your back."

"Naruto isn't mine..." Hinata corrected hesitantly, "Besides, if not for Sakura then Naruto-kun would be dead."

"But if Sakura hadn't gone behind all of our backs then-"

"Quiet down! You're arguing isn't going to make this storm go away sooner!" Tenten said to reprimand her fellow kunoichi, "On the bright side, we've taken care of the traitor and Naruto's going to make a full recovery."

"More than one person is responsible for the current situation. But I say that we cool it down until Naruto heals." Shikamaru stated to the group, "We should've came to our conclusion a long time ago and included Naruto from the start...he's the one whose been most affected by everything Sasuke's done after all."

"Isn't that why Sakura was supposed to be out here?"

"Is that you're all here? To make sure I didn't fuck it up?"

"Actually, we're here on Tsunade's orders." Neji answered to Sakura's tearful joy and relief, "She's still under medical watch, but she's alive. We informed her about the situation with Danzo becoming temporary hokage and she was...pissed to say the least."

"We were sent to find reinforce Naruto in whatever he was doing, " Shikamaru added and then lazily nodded to Konohamaru, "The kid followed us and if he's good enough to stay undetected until we were halfway here...he might as well make himself useful."

"We were all genin once, remember?" Yamato inquired when he stepped in from outside, his attire drenched and fairly dirty, "I have good news and bad news friends. The good news is that the storm should let up in less than two days."

"Thanks Tenzo."

"Don't thank me yet, Senpai..." Yamato added and motioned with his thumb towards the surrounding woods, "We're being watched."

Author's Notes:

So this story has a mixed reception at the moment.

That's fine, considering my mixed views on Naruto. But I'll admit that I am annoyed about the accusations of "twisting the facts" to suit my own needs. Perhaps there is some truth to Sakura's confession, but the way that she worded and everyone's in-story response just makes it seem like it was fake. Not to mention the observation and later confirmation that Sakura still loves Sasuke. I didn't make any of that stuff up. It is all in the manga.

But as pointed out in this story, that's not the biggest issue. It's just a symptom of Sakura's impulsive immaturity that Naruto just got fed up with dealing with. The confession was meant to bring Naruto home when she could have just told him about the K-11's conviction to kill Sasuke. Then she leaves and drags Kiba and Lee with her to take down Sasuke themselves when there's no way in hell that they would stand a chance against Sasuke if he had been at full strength. She then gasses them because she has to take care of Sasuke herself.

Look how well that turned out.

Again, it's all in the manga. The manga still applies up to where Naruto clashes with Sasuke. The thing that I've diverged is that Naruto sensibly uses the Wind Release: Rasengan with clear and present results.

So there. I'm not going out of my way to bash Sakura, she just keeps throwing shit in my way that's too huge to ignore. That said, I will have Naruto and Sakura eventually reconcile and become friends again. But only after both have gone through some serious mental and emotional self-examination which they really need. There's a difference between being critical of a character and blind bashing and I've done enough homework to know that it's not the latter.