I have no excuses, really. I stepped away from fandom for a bit. I had another kid, and stopped writing for a while. That's about all I can say. Anyway, this is HUGE. And folks, sorry but I'm not going over 100 pages in a single chapter. I'm posting 3? chapters today on November 22 2015, and I know I said one more, I'm sorry. But here's about...I don't know. A lot of pages to chew on. Yep. I sat down and wrote over 70 freakin' pages. I didn't realize there was so much left when it was actually written out instead of in its neat little outline and bare bones. But yes, all these chapters compose of the final part of the story, so prepare for your final hundred or so pages. (omg). If the next part isn't up by next week Sunday, please, come give me a kick in the ass. Tumblr's on my page. As always, this is unbeta'd. Anyone interested in beta'ing hit me up. I'd be happy to return the favor

Curse

The sky had disappeared. It boiled with forest fire and smoke.

Sasuke felt a tremor shiver up his legs until it reached his gut, and he bent over, spitting blood at the grass. The fire was close now. He could feel it. Hear it. The smoke grew denser. His eyes watered, blind eye swiveling behind its blindfold. Sasuke could feel the heat sear deep in his lungs with each pant of breath.

Blindly, he reached out to his right. His fingers grasped at air, but he knew Naruto was close by, just out of reach. He couldn't see, but Sasuke could hear him, breathing slow and hard. He heard the rustle as Naruto shifted his weight from one leg to the other, the pained hiss of his breath.

Sasuke wondered how badly Naruto was bleeding, and he looked ahead, grimacing. Sasuke's one eye bored into the sightless pink eye of the rat summon before him. She could not see him, he knew, but she could feel him. Her whiskers twitched. She was heaving under the forest fire heat, mouth gaping open. She rested over the splinters of the porch, her tail having gouged through the kitchen wall.

Their home, Sasuke realized numbly, was ruined.

"I will ask you one more time," and Sasuke straightened to his full height. "Who sent you?"

The summon laughed. She dragged herself closer, the ugly hole Naruto had punched into her belly muddying the ground red. "I am not so easily swayed, Uchiha." She snapped her incisors. "But we will find what we have come for. You have lived in peace for eighteen years. More than you have ever deserved." Her eyes fixed on him steadily, unwavering.

"You are a cursed man, Uchiha."

And maybe he was. Naruto was limping at his side. A heavy hand clapped on his shoulder, Naruto's blond head bent forward. Sasuke could smell the blood and sweat.

"You got nothing left," Naruto growled in warning. He looked feral. Lethal, his lips curled like a wild thing. The rat licked her teeth.

"I can smell it," she hissed. Sasuke's heart thudded in his chest, and a fear he hadn't felt in a while crept up his spine and into his brain. Naruto was rigid at Sasuke's side. His fingers bit deep into the cleft at Sasuke's shoulder.

"What's it trying to say..." Naruto muttered, voice hoarse. Sasuke clapped his hand over Naruto's, the pads of his fingertips brushing over cracked knuckles. His right eye began to spasm, and he could feel the pain, slow at first, like an ice pick jabbing at a weak spot. Little fractures sprouting from his temple to his jaw. He turned to his head to glance at the huddled groups of rats he'd captured in an illusion, They stared up at the sky they couldn't see. The number of them sickened him, made his legs quake. He could see no grass. Only rats. And still, he and Naruto had only made a dent in their numbers. The only, and last, great illusion of this battle.

Sasuke said, "Don't listen to it."

And Sasuke thought, as his hand clasped with Naruto's and their home lay in ruin before them, their children gone, vanished into the mountainside, that he really was a cursed man.

"I can smell it," whispered the rat, and her pink eyes widened. "I can smell the little one."

Sasuke's stomach roiled and ached. Naruto was still, a frozen look of dawning horror pulling at his features. He hissed, "motherfucker." Naruto's hand left Sasuke's shoulder, and Sasuke could feel the wind pick up at his feet as a clone burst into existence. Sasuke turned his head and he saw now, the blood running down Naruto's side, his right arm hanging limp and nearly useless, clumsily bandaged by a torn sleeve. It was flayed, ripped open. It hadn't begun to heal. Sasuke wondered if their children were safe. He sucked in a breath through his teeth.

An anger so bleak and bone-deep Sasuke couldn't suppress it surged through his veins. Faster than he felt he was able to at that moment, his sword was drawn, pointed at the eye of the rat, just a hair's breadth away from stabbing through the pale pink jelly.

"Over my dead body," Naruto snarled beside him.

"That can be arranged, Jinchuuriki." The rat smiled. Her eye swiveled.

"Let's hit it, boss, be done with it," said the clone to Naruto through clenched teeth, and Sasuke smirked. Something hollow and dangerous. The point of his drawn katana shook slightly.

"Oh," said Sasuke quietly, "I'll kill you first."

"Why now?" Naruto's voice was low and guttural, like he couldn't place the injustice of it all. His eyes were wide.

"You know it's war. And you're bound." Naruto's eyes flicked to the tag in the rat's right ear, the one Sasuke had briefly puzzled over earlier, surprised to have seen it. His own gaze swiveled to it.

"You're a slave," Naruto hissed, and the rat stiffened. Sasuke watched her squirm.

"You're a slave. Your kids," Naruto nodded over at the rats still huddled in groups, staring listlessly, "they'll always be slaves under a contract you can't touch. They'll use you and your family to fight their battles until they've killed you, and still you do whatever they want. You're just sendin' your kids over here to die for a man's power struggle that in the end, will mean nothing to you."

The rat sucked in a deep breath. "How dare you?" she bawled, and in her anger she tried to stand, to right herself. Sasuke jumped away, pulling Naruto with him by the sleeve, trying to ignore how Naruto grimaced as more blood dripped down his side through the bandaged cloth.

"How DARE you! We have served the Fire Country proudly for generations! My children will live, as I have, and they will grow, as I have done, and when I see you dead for your crimes against this human land, my children will speak to their children of how great a battle they fought the day I led them to Uzumaki Naruto and Uchiha Sasuke! When I snap your heads off your necks!"

The rat's head lunged forward, her jaws snapping viciously, but Sasuke sidestepped the movement, Naruto close by. Sasuke watched her thrash, wild and enraged. She had lost. Her use of ninjutsu had surprised both him and Naruto-who only knew of the toads' ability to wield such power. She had proved a formidable, impressive opponent. Her injuries had slowed her.

"Naruto-" Sasuke breathed, but Naruto said nothing in reply, only looked at the rat thrashing on the porch, transfixed, as her teeth snapped through wood and anything that came too close.

"Tell us who sent you," Naruto asked again, and this time he smoothed the bite in his voice, his expression schooled into something battle-hard, a slight frown wrinkling his brow. "What's happening beyond the village? I might be able to rip that tag from you myself. If you keep your secrets, I will keep yours. See you and your children off this mountain." It was his only offering.

She ignored him. "I will see you dead, Uzumaki! And then I will find them!" the rat screeched. The determined war-look on Naruto's face did not change, and he did not flinch. "I will find your children! And when I do-"

Sasuke did not wait for her to finish. He spun around to look at the first group of huddled rats. Sasuke's eye widened. The pain in his head stabbed at his brow. At once, the rats were engulfed in the hungry teeth of black flames.

"Wait, Sasuke-"

But it was already done.

The rats cried, "MOTHER!" Sasuke thought of his daughter, silent and pale, and his son, stubborn and angry, racing down the dirt road at night. He ignored the pain.

"My children," bawled the rat, "my children. What-what are you doing to them?" she scrambled to her feet, swaying, before falling heavily. "What are you doing to them?"

"Tell us who sent you, and it will end," said Sasuke tonelessly, over the crescendo of their screams, the heat of the fires.

The rat stared ahead at nothing, wild-eyed. "Where are you, children?" she dragged herself over the ruined house. "I'm here! I'm here!"

It grew quiet. The fires of Amaterasu began to eat at the dirt. Sasuke could feel Naruto staring at him. He hung at the corner of Sasuke's senses like a ghost. They would talk about it later.

"Where have they gone? Where?! Why are they not crying?" The rat pricked her ears, searching.

Sasuke only said, "Tell me." Naruto looked straight ahead, quiet. He did not argue.

She spat at them. "DAMN you! DAMN YOU!"

"Very well." The mangekyo spun.

"They will kill you, Uchiha, if I do not do it first."

Another group burned. The rat wailed. "I WILL DRAG YOU TO THE PITS OF HELL MYSELF, UCHIHA!"

It grew quiet again. Amaterasu raced wickedly through the burned lawn in tiny jagged flames, through the grass Minato used to train on, through the gardens Mikoto played in.

Sasuke rubbed away tears at the corners of his left eye. When he looked at his fingers, he saw they were stained red.

"No more," said Naruto in his ear, "it's too much, Sasuke. Fire's gettin' too close. It'll be on us any minute-" But then the rat screamed, "I WILL KEEP YOUR SECRETS."

Sasuke stilled. Naruto bent his head in relief. The rat laughed. "Oh, I will keep them. Because when I find your children, I will eat them myself. I'll tear the boy limb from limb. I will make sure the little one screams. And I'll leave their bones for my children to gnaw on." She laughed when Sasuke burned another group of her children. He ignored Naruto's shouts, the vision blurring in his left eye, the pain in his head.

It was too much. But Sasuke didn't care.

She was next, Sasuke thought, Naruto's voice drowned and gutted as Sasuke fled to his thoughts. When he burned through them all, the she-rat was next.

Sasuke's world burned away. The rat stood on her last legs, and she heaved herself upright, into a fighting stance.

Sasuke did not stop burning the world away. The fire ran rampant. An attempt to stop the flames only burst a blood vessel in his eye, the pain in his temple reaching a peak.

It wasn't working. He couldn't quell the flames.

He didn't care.

The she-rat leaped, lunged. Sasuke ducked, avoiding the teeth to his head. He did not look away. When she landed, Naruto's clone cracked her jaw with a punch. He was screaming.

The tail lashed, gouging the earth behind Sasuke as he burned, dirt and grass and debris rising in a wave behind him. Naruto yelled, flipping over the naked tail as it whipped toward him, the sound eerily quiet and drowned away as if in a dream. Amaterasu did not stop burning. Naruto shucked a chakra-charged kunai and struck the she-rat clean through the throat; she'd finally slowed enough for a decent ranged hit. The blade sailed away as her tail grew larger and longer and faster and faster. She reared backward.

Sasuke did not move. He only burned. An old rage he'd forgotten chanted like a drum in his heart, the snare in his brain, keeping everything else at bay.

He couldn't stop.

"SASUKE!"

And that was when Sasuke noticed the world again for what it was. He blinked. There was a blur everywhere he looked, but he could see the black flames racing for him, the moving little points. It was then he finally noticed the rat, jaws open wide. She was falling, he realized. She'd taken a hit and she was falling, but she'd snapped her neck to the side as gravity pulled at her weight.

Amaterasu never stopped burning.

The she-rat was planning on taking his head in her jaws as she fell.

The world was smudged. The rat was a wide streak of white against a burning world. He couldn't see Naruto.

Amaterasu was running ravenous. The rats were gone. The flames ate at the house he and Naruto had worked so tirelessly to restore.

It was gone.

Smoke billowed and rose. The fire cackled and danced. Soon, it would reach him, devour their very own creator, if he did not run. He no longer possessed the power to extinguish or control it, only create, and wait until it died away.

"Sasuke!"

He turned on his heel as her head came down. It would be an easy escape. Once more, he tried to absorb the black flames.

A skull-splitting pain exploded near his temple. He'd overdone it, and his body was choosing this moment to remind him of the price he'd paid for Amaterasu. His vision blurred, curling in like the burning edges of a photograph. His teetered off balance. The fire worsened. And in that second, Sasuke knew he wouldn't be quick enough. He fell. The flames, uncontrolled, raced toward him in hunger. The rat's mouth swallowed the sky above him. Sasuke could feel the boiling heat of the fire, drawing closer. It would not be an easy escape. The world went black. He nearly sank to his knees under a sudden, terrible weight that sucked the breath from his lungs.

"SASUKE! NO!"

It was Naruto. He felt Naruto, pulling, at his side, yelling on top of him. The rat twitched. Her massive head was lying on top of them.

"You...you idiot," Naruto chastised when they were all on the ground, and Sasuke realized the darkness for what it was: Naruto's hand clapped over his eyes in a desperate attempt to stop the Mangekyo, trying to keep it from teasing the flames. It was Naruto who had blacked out the world. Sasuke reached up to gently pry Naruto's fingers away.

Naruto bared his teeth in a crooked battle-smile when his face came into focus. "When was the last time...you let your anger control you like that? You're here, not Susano'o." Naruto's breath fell in hot puffs on Sasuke's neck, his head lolling on his shoulder.

Sasuke could smell the blood. He felt that fear again. The pain in his head fogged his vision still, locked his legs. The fire began to lick at the body of the rat, slowly inching up her tail in jet flames. A squeal bubbled in her throat. She did not move.

"Aw, fuck," Naruto whispered against his skin.

Sasuke's eye widened as his vision began to adjust. "Moron," he seethed, but it wasn't really anger clawing up his throat, making it hurt and close. "What have you done?" Sasuke said this quieter, softer.

Naruto sucked down a ragged breath and winced. "Saved your ungrateful ass, that's what." He tried to laugh. It didn't work. The rat only bit down harder. The life spilled slowly from her eyes. She had Naruto's side in her teeth, his once-useless arm now lost in the pit of her jaws. Naruto grunted, slapping his left hand on her pink nose to push her away, like she was an unruly dog playing a little too hard. Her nose wrinkled in a silent snarl.

"It wasn't supposed to go like this," said Naruto. "This was supposed to be easy."

Sasuke pulled himself upright as the rat's teeth scraped across Naruto's side. His sword-where was his sword? He shouted in anguished, he couldn't see properly anyway. There wasn't enough time to bother looking for it. His hands formed seals as quickly as his body would allow. The sky rumbled, the clouds surged. Precious seconds passed. He watched the rat bleed out, Amaterasu gnawing at her hide now. Naruto sank against her white muzzle. It took too much time to gather this much energy at once.

His dragons finally came, hailing from roiling clouds as they spun over Sasuke's head, hissing and cackling as they lunged for the rat's neck. It was an expensive technique in his condition. He hadn't activated Amaterasu in such quick succession since his days in Team Taka, and even then, it was a technique that had never been meant to be abused. His pain intensified. His legs shook. Bile stung the back of his throat.

Calling forth the dragons took the last of his chakra reserves, and Sasuke fell to his knees. They coiled around the she-rat like snakes, and not once did she let go, even when they burned through her skin and her head popped from her shoulders.

He should have done it earlier. Saved them the trouble. The pain.

Let's talk to her, first, Naruto had decided, and Sasuke had agreed. See if we can find out what's going on. We'll corner her. It won't take long. But don't kill her! Naruto had urged, and they had indulged the she-rat, danced around her for far too long.

Sasuke tried, unsuccessfully, to pull Naruto free from the rat's jaws as painlessly as possible. The fire was crawling onto the rat's back. It wouldn't be long until it reached the neck, before it spilled toward the ground and found the rat's head. Before it found Naruto.

Sasuke tried to pry the beast's mouth open, yelling as he heaved. Naruto cursed, squeezing his eyes shut. The rat's teeth had not relinquished their hold. Sasuke's vision blurred. It was difficult to see. He concentrated on the rusted color of Naruto's shirt. He felt sick. It should have been orange.

"I-"

Naruto bared his teeth. "Don't hesitate, teme, just pull, and don't look at me like that. It's okay, I promise." He tried to soften his voice, but it cracked in his throat. "It's fucking gone, anyway. Just...just pull." Naruto's eyes were glazed, his lips bloodless. He tried to smooth his features, but Sasuke could still see his pain.

"Naruto-"

"Trust me, Sasuke. I'm hangin' by a thread here," Naruto interrupted thickly, in agony.

Sasuke shook his head. "On three."

"No," Naruto gasped, his face pinched. "Do it. Do it now-!"

"One," Sasuke breathed, ignoring him, and he wondered if it was more for himself than for Naruto, "two..." he paused, closing his eye.

Naruto laughed hollowly. "Done in by a damn rat. Can you believe this shit?"

Sasuke took a breath. "Three." He pulled. Naruto shouted. Sasuke's heart jolted. Naruto's right arm stayed lost in the rat's jaws, and Sasuke gathered him in his lap. He ripped the fabric of his shirt and tied a hasty tourniquet around the bleeding stump. He was no medic. It was all he knew. Grabbing Naruto under the arms, he hauled backward in a frenzy until he'd put enough feet between themselves and the fire to rest for a moment. Sasuke was shaking. His fingers felt too stiff, too clumsy. He cursed, pausing to tie the knot again, squinting, relying on muscle memory to get it right.

"Don't overdo it, S'ke," muttered Naruto through clenched teeth. Sasuke could feel a blistering heat on his skin. The fire had reached the rat's head. It would spread again. Looking. Searching. Hungry. He kept blinking at the world ahead, like it might become clearer. He closed his eyes. It might take some time. The pain had dulled, but it was enough to make him wish for a dreamless and sudden sleep, even in the midst of a fire.

"Fire's comin'," said Naruto hoarsely. "Gotta get running." He pushed at Sasuke. Sasuke held him fast.

"Idiot," Sasuke hissed, "you can't run like this." His hands still shook. His arms tingled numbly.

Naruto whispered. He might have said, "You can." Sasuke pretended not to hear.

Naruto swallowed, and for once he looked afraid. He let his head drop against Sasuke's chest. "The kids. Oh god, the kids."

Sasuke cursed, closing his eye again. He imagined their faces. He wondered if Mikoto was crying. He wondered how angry Minato was.

"Minato can look after her, and himself." Sasuke meant it.

"He's a good kid," Naruto agreed, and then he asked, "did I do the wrong thing, Sasuke? I mean, it was me who wanted-" and Sasuke's gut clenched.

"Shut up for now. Let me see what I can do-" Sasuke had no idea what to do. He kept trying to kick his brain into gear. The world stopped when Naruto did. The heat on Sasuke's skin began to burn. He dragged Naruto farther back.

The kids, he thought. The kids.

His vision wasn't clearing.

"Do. You. Think. I did the wrong thing?" Naruto's words came out in a rush of breath. "I'm thinkin' maybe I did. Maybe I really did do him wrong. Everything he was so angry for...because I couldn't tell him jackshit." Naruto grimaced, breathing harshly.

Sasuke changed the subject. "Why aren't you healing?" He hated how gutted his voice sounded, how it rasped. Naruto blinked. He shifted in Sasuke's lap.

"You were right, you know?" Naruto continued, ignoring the question. He winced, throwing his head back, face twisting. "I was being a coward that time. About Minato."

Sasuke shook his head. He felt hollowed out. "Stop talking."

Naruto wheezed on a dry laugh, eyes closed. He tried to look up at Sasuke and cursed violently. Naruto fell silent. He and Sasuke watched the fire. Just for a moment.

"Sometimes I wonder if I should have done things differently," Naruto admitted. His voice was too constricted, like he was trying to speak through a straw, and Sasuke knew he was talking about the war. He said nothing, only grabbed Naruto's remaining hand.

"Look at this fucking place. Sometimes I wonder...I wonder if I did that. Maybe I didn't. Not alone. But maybe I helped. Nothing's changed. It's gotten worse. And our kids have to live in this fucking mess we still haven't picked up. This system that still hasn't changed. Makes ya wonder...Makes ya wonder why we had to go through all that as kids anyway. We never realized it then, did we? About the kids. 'Specially now that we have our own..." Naruto's Adam's apple bobbed in his throat.

"You can't shoulder it all like a martyr all the damn time. Kakashi's still out there. You were right," Sasuke reminded him.

"Yeah," Naruto interrupted dully. He drew a breath, bending his head closer. "Yeah." He blinked rapidly. "I miss the kids. Maybe Kosuke found 'em by now. I hope Mikoto isn't too scared." He laughed, but it was more of a breathy gasp. "You know-you know she can't even handle it when the hallway's dark. And I think Minato left his shoes. He's probably wandering around barefoot and grumpy..." Naruto rambled, trailing off, the crooked grin freezing on his face.

He was losing too much blood, Sasuke knew.

Sasuke hung his head, trying not to look. "You need to stop talking. We need to get out of here. Kosuke will signal us soon, and we'll see the kids." The heat grew more unbearable. He could feel the sweat trickling down his skin. The fire cackled and popped. He dropped his forehead against Naruto's.

"Stay awake."

"Yeah," Naruto sighed. "Okay."

Sasuke hefted Naruto onto his back, who hung on limply, hooking his left arm around Sasuke's neck. Sasuke paused uncertainly, squinting, trying to gauge where to run.

"Can you even see?" Naruto asked against the back of Sasuke's neck, dubious, as the fire roared behind them. "You got a little trigger happy back there-"

"I can see," Sasuke retorted, then quietly he added, "somewhat."

Naruto snorted. "We got a one-armed man bleeding and delirious on the back of a blind man, trying to run from an unnatural fire that's eating everything. Should be fun."

Sasuke didn't reply. He ran. Naruto's blood was slick and warm on his skin. He ran faster. They flew down the hill, leaving their little house behind. Sasuke didn't look back. It was over. It was gone. He would think about it later. He skidded to a stop when he saw, ahead, that the forest fire had cut off his route down the winding narrow road. He ground his teeth in irritation, cursing. He blinked away ash that began to fall from the sky, rethinking their escape as Naruto muttered, "shit" against his skin. Sasuke realized there was another presence on the road. He tensed.

"HEY! HEYYYY! OVER HERE!"

A woman was waving them over, frantically, a white towel whipping like a flag through the smoke. A group of stragglers lingered behind her. Sasuke coughed and darted toward the group.

There were four women and five children. The woman who had waved them over tied the rag over her face, dark with soot and streaked with sweat. One of her comrades offered her two more, soaked in warm water. Sasuke allowed her to cover him, and Naruto. She grimaced when she saw him, glancing up at Sasuke sharply.

"Quickly. We've been gathering up whoever we can. I'll do what I can for him when we've reached the bottom." Then she asked, "can you run?" There was a heaviness to her voice, something dreadful, cautious. Her words held a different meaning.

Sasuke scowled. "Of course." She nodded quickly, and didn't say another word.

Sasuke eyed the group, noting how small they were for how hard this woman must have worked to gather them. He said nothing about it. He let Naruto slide forward, and ran as the group turned. The women bounded forward with the speed of ninja after hefting children onto their backs. One was older, her hair white with age. But she was strong.

So they were kunoichi. Sasuke knew the mountain had its own little base offered to the town by the Fire Lord once the school opened, but these women wore no hitai-ate with the country's universal Fire symbol and black ribbon all Guardian nin had adopted, and neither did the children.

They found the river quickly enough, and followed it, down, down, down, until Sasuke could see the rapids foaming ahead, gnashing against the riverbed rocks like teeth. Sometimes children darted through the trees. They didn't come when called, only ran faster. Little flocks of spooked birds. Sasuke searched each face desperately. Neither were Mikoto. Neither were Minato. He ignored the ache in his gut. Just for now.

Kosuke would find them, he reminded himself. Minato would keep himself and Mikoto safe until Kosuke reached them.

They were nearing the waterfall. Naruto slipped once, sliding off to the side, and Sasuke cursed, his heart hammering wildly.

"Naruto!"

"Mmmm?" was the reply, then he muttered, "I'm not dead yet, teme."

Sasuke grunted, satisfied.

"Here," snapped the oldest woman at the front, and the group turned at once on their heels, darting into a series of caves that honeycombed the cliffs against the waterfall.

It was dark. It was suffocating. Sasuke thought he could still feel the heat over the water's spray. They were traveling deeper, and deeper still.

Naruto was quiet.

Sasuke ran faster. He thought of the children.

No one came after them.

Finally they burst into daylight, miles away from the river on another side of the forest, and Sasuke could see it was morning. The sky an unblemished sheet of pale blue. No clouds. His vision had cleared, just enough. He looked back. Just once.

The mountain burned.

Sasuke's could feel the heat in his bones. It had never left.

"Here," someone barked, and Sasuke turned to see the woman who'd flagged him down from earlier. She ripped the towel from her face, and he noticed the hooked, thin scar that ran down her brown skin from the corner of her eye to the other side of her mouth. She quickly disposed of the clumsy bandage Sasuke had created, and tied a tighter tourniquet around Naruto's right elbow as Sasuke wordlessly laid Naruto on the grass.

"I can do it here," she said again, but it was more to herself than Sasuke. She summoned chakra to her hands, and it glowed a healing green. She bent over Naruto, her face pinching as she focused. There was a quick talent and skill to her thin fingers and how quickly they probed and searched, stopping the blood flow. Another woman stepped up to tie her dark hair in a knot to keep it from falling into her eyes as she worked.

"Thank you, Hoshi. Asuka, I need you now."

Sasuke watched, still as stone, kneeling on the grass. Naruto's eyes were closed.

The old woman dropped to her knees, hands already glowing green. Asuka whistled low. "He's a hell of a fighter to have taken so much. I didn't realize it was this bad," she admitted.

Slowly, Naruto's muscles stitched back together. Asuka's round face tilted to look up at Sasuke, gravely, before dropping her voice and looking to the woman opposite her.

Sasuke pretended not to notice. He kept his eye fixed on Naruto's face. Naruto looked paler, Sasuke thought, his face ashy. Sasuke tried not to think. He listened.

"Aya," Asuka whispered, "I don't think-"

"I don't want to hear it," Aya snapped under her breath, and Asuka rolled her eyes, irritated. "Keep working. I've got a handle on the bleeding. You deal with his side. I've got the arm."

Asuka spoke again, louder this time. "He's lost too much blood. He's hardly breathing, he could be going into shock." She looked up at Sasuke. "We don't have the resources to-"

"I don't care," Sasuke interrupted in a snarl, and Asuka's thin lips held together in a tight, grim line.

"You took the time to stop for us. Do it."

Asuka's eyes narrowed, and Sasuke wondered if she might try to hit him, or draw a kunai.

"We're trying," Aya assured him, her eyes never once leaving the patient laid before her. Asuka muttered under her breath, looking nervously to the mountain ahead. It smoked.

"So," Asuka picked at conversation as Hoshi and the others herded the children together behind them. "Who is he? Your neighbor? Your friend? Or is he a relative? Pretty sure I've met the majority of the mountain's married couples. I don't recall ever seeing you two around. Or are you new?"

Sasuke blinked. He said, "my husband," without bothering to remember that they had never legally married.

Asuka stopped talking. She cursed and closed her eyes, but her hands never stopped their work. "I stand corrected. I'm sorry."

Sasuke scowled. "We've never crossed paths."

Asuka sighed. "I guess it's to be expected. There'd have to be someone I'd never met eventually. Aya and I live up near the fields. My husband, too, but lucky for him, he'd gone away for trade a couple days prior."

Sasuke's eyes flicked to the others behind them in a silent question.

Asuka understood, but it was Aya who spoke. "Hoshi and her wife, Etsuko, live with their children not far from where we found you. The kunoichi and her team came too close. We helped them escape."

"Kunoichi?" Sasuke asked, looking over his shoulder.

Aya nodded, grim. "There's a few special ops teams. They're cleansing the village. Apparently rogue assassins fled here. The Fire Lord isn't taking chances, or prisoners. He's 'containing the problem' before it infects the country any further. Cut off the arm before it kills the rest of the body." She pulled a face. "It's mass murder, that's what it is." She bit her lip to keep from saying anything else.

Asuka shook her head angrily. "My husband and I retired long ago Before the reform. But Aya, and Hoshi and Etsuko..." she stopped, trailing off. Aya's brows knit together.

"The system's fucked," Aya gritted out, darting a glance at the children, but they hadn't heard. Two toddlers were playing with sticks while a teenage boy helped his mothers calm down a small girl, her twin stuck fast to her side. "Academy drop-outs are being given rogue status. It's out of control. Lower-income villages like this one have overcrowded academies. The drop-out rates are usually high in places like these. But the government compensates you for every household member enrolled once your kid's name's on the roster." She paused to finish the bandage on Naruto's elbow.

"I'd graduated, even reached chuunin status before I dropped off the radar. Hoshi and Etsuko were jounin from a recently established village on the Eastern border. There's a government program that's churning out soldier nin and recruiters for the country's bloodline limits there. That's what they ran from."

Sasuke nodded, weary.

"The kids all theirs, then?" he asked suddenly, his eyes still trained on Naruto's face.

Aya smiled a little. "Yep. All five. They're good kids."

"We have two," Sasuke heard himself say hoarsely, and Asuka looked up at him sharply.

"Are they-" she began, and Sasuke ducked his head.

"I don't know," he admitted, and his throat tightened. "I don't know. We were attacked. We sent them running down the road, hoping they would escape." He didn't know why he was saying anything at all, but it lessened the ache in his throat, in his chest, everywhere. The anger didn't cool. His fingers twitched. He watched Naruto, who was so, so still.

"Just about done," murmured Asuka.

"Take his hand," said Aya, still not looking up. "Sometimes it helps."

Naruto's fingers were cold and limp. Sasuke tightened his grip.

You damn fox, he thought, heal him. Do it. You always have before.

Naruto stayed sleeping. No matter how hard Sasuke thought, how violently he cursed the demon fox, Naruto didn't wake.

Each heartbeat in Sasuke's chest struck like a tightly wound chord.

Then they were done, and Aya and Asuka backed away. They were wondering if this was goodbye, Sasuke realized. He had been fortunate. He bowed his head in gratitude.

"I won't move him like this." He didn't look up at them. They understood.

"The children," began Asuka suddenly, and she looked toward the mountain. "What do they look like? If we see them at the base, we'll safely send them this way."

"If our friend got to them first, I doubt you'll find them," Sasuke answered. "But," he paused, wondering if he should risk continuing. He took the risk. "They answer to Minato and Mikoto. Our daughter's five. Black hair. Black eyes. Minato's eighteen. My height. Dark eyes. Black hair. They... have marks-" his thumb brushed Naruto's cheek.

Asuka nodded once. "We'll keep an eye out," she promised.

Sasuke didn't look up. "I would be grateful." He meant it.

Hoshi and Etsuko gathered their children. Asuka goaded one of the smaller children to let go of Etsuko and climb on her back. Aya nodded to Sasuke. Hoshi dropped bottles of water, and Etsuko left protein bars. They nodded to him silently, their faces still hidden by their rags.

"Stay out of sight."

Sasuke said, "don't get caught."

They vanished.

After, Sasuke realized they never asked for his name.