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The Long Way Home

Part 11

Awakening

Chapter 5/5

Naruto woke up to a darkened room and the soft sounds of Sasuke sleeping somewhere off to his right. Their futons can't have been set up more than a meter apart but it took him a few moments of laying in the darkness to hear Sasuke's slow, deep breathing.

The room was still incredibly dark with no hint of dawn approaching so Naruto realized he must have been asleep only a few hours before waking up again and couldn't work out what might have awoken him. Surely no loud noises had disturbed him because Sasuke was still sleeping peacefully.

His head didn't even hurt, he realized in sudden relief. It was the first time in a long time when he hadn't woken up feeling the pain and it was actually a powerful feeling that swept over him in that moment that was more than relief and more like a deep thankfulness.

Well it looked as though the doctor had been right. He really had just needed some rest and everything was okay again. The only downside was now that he didn't feel sleepy anymore. Of course that wasn't particularly surprising. The last couple of days he'd slept more than he had the entire week beforehand so it wasn't such a shock that he felt so awake now.

He debated whether to wake Sasuke up and tell him the good news but didn't feel like being told off or being hit, both of which were likely.

Oh well, he shrugged, maybe now that he was feeling so much better he could get back to his training again. And hopefully now whatever sickness he'd had wouldn't be made worse by the mental exercise like it used to be.

He sat up on his futon cross-legged and closed his eyes, attempting to get his breathing and heartbeat back to normal after his elation. Eventually he got himself into a more peaceful state and cracked an eye open just to make sure Sasuke was still safely asleep.

Once he figured he was safe, he closed his eye again and spent a few more moments trying to achieve a calm. He let his mind go blank and opened himself up to his surroundings while at the same time not letting it distract him. He just let it wash over him and through him and he felt the nature energy begin to flow through his muscles before...

Naruto threw his head back and screamed as pain shot through him more suddenly and with more severity than he had ever experienced before. All of his limbs froze up so harshly that his muscles cramped reflexively as he stiffened up.

Needless to say he lost his calm in an instant and a few seconds later as the pain receded just enough so he could take a deep breath of air again, his limbs finally went limp and he fell backwards on his futon, breathing hard and raggedly while it felt like someone was trying to pick his brain out through his eyeballs with a rusty dagger.

As the initial pain lessened a little more he became aware of being roughly shook and gingerly opened his eyes to see twin dark orbs staring down at him. Eventually he even began to hear what Sasuke was saying too.

"- the fuck were you doing?"

"Sasuke, stop yelling!"

Actually his own voice was way too loud, much louder than Sasuke had been and he realized that Sasuke was merely speaking at a normal tone, but it still seemed to hurt his head.

"You haven't heard yelling," Sasuke warned him darkly. "If you don't tell me what you were doing I will yell at you. The way you were sitting..."

Sasuke's voice tapered off for a moment before he reached down and wiped a finger just above Naruto's lip. Sasuke looked down at his finger darkened with blood and his glare intensified.

He could lie, after all it wasn't like it was all that meditating and drawing in nature energy that was hurting him. I mean sure, it did seem to make it worse sometimes but that was only because he'd been getting sick anyway... right?

Naruto suddenly felt very stupid. Unfortunately he didn't have a chance to lie because Sasuke seemed to have just about figured it out for himself.

"There is no way you are stupid enough to try and draw in nature energy when I told you not to," Sasuke began in a low tone. "Who knows what happened to us."

"You told..." Naruto had to swallow and try again. It was really hard to talk at the moment. "You told me not to do it," he eventually agreed. "But not for the same reasons. I'm pretty sure if you'd said that it would make my brain explode I would've remembered."

Sasuke sat back with an almost disgusted look on his face. "All this time, you've been doing this to yourself."

"Not on purpose!"

"Is this what you've been doing all those nights when you were supposed to be sleeping?"

"Not every night. And if I knew that's what was making my head hurt all the time I would've stopped. I knew it made me feel worse sometimes but I thought it was because I was sick, not that it was making me sick!"

"And I suppose you never made the connection?"

"No," Naruto admitted reluctantly.

"Tch. Maybe you really are that stupid."

Sasuke got up to leave him to pant on the floor and Naruto was left feeling bad. As if the pain wasn't enough the feeling of failure was even more acute. He'd only been doing this to make himself stronger and more useful. But all he'd ended up doing was make himself weaker and even more of a burden. And apparently Sasuke really blamed him for this, which he felt was unfortunately very valid.

He should have worked it out for himself a long time ago.

He had thought that Sasuke was just going to leave him like this and ignore him like he usually would when he was pissed at him. But Sasuke came back a few moments later with a mug filled with sweet smelling water that Naruto recognized as the herb the doctor had given them.

He helped Naruto sit up and drink it all before none too gently getting him back into his bed so Naruto could rest. Moments later he heard Sasuke roughly getting back into his own bed and then nothing but silence. Sasuke obviously wasn't going back to sleep and the silence between them was louder and more hurtful than his words had been before.

"Sasuke-"

"Shut up."

"But I-"

"You don't want to talk to me right now," Sasuke said warningly.

"I have to."

Sasuke let out something that sounded like a half sigh, half growl and then Naruto could hear him shifting in his bedding.

"You didn't do this on purpose, did you?"

It took Naruto's pained brain a few moments to understand the meaning behind that question. And even when he did he was still confused.

"Why would I? You think I liked being in pain or that you had to look after me?"

Sasuke didn't reply and Naruto was shocked to realise that Sasuke did seem to think it had been part of his motive.

"I don't want to be a burden," Naruto told him forcefully.

"You said that before," Sasuke replied a little more calmly.

"Then why do you have to ask?"

"Looking after you meant that I... forget it. You're stupid but you aren't deceitful I suppose."

"I can't believe you would even think that!" Naruto said hotly.

"Yeah because it's not like you to want to be the center of attention."

Something subtle in Sasuke's voice had changed then and Naruto almost missed it. Almost.

"You're teasing me now."

"You deserve it. But I suppose this is good news in a strange way."

"How?" Naruto asked grumpily.

"Because it means that your cure is as easy as stopping. It means we can move on."

In a way Sasuke was right. He might still feel a little rotten for a few days but all he had to do was stop trying to draw in nature energy and the pain should go away on its own just like it had started to before. It still didn't alleviate him feeling as stupid as Sasuke told him he was, or the feeling of guilt he had about the last few days but Sasuke didn't seem half as pissed as he had five minutes ago, which was a good thing.

"Are you still pissed?"

"Yes," Sasuke answered frankly.

"You're not going to let me live this down, are you?"

"No. Still feel like talking?"

"No."

"Good."


It was probably harsh to make Naruto travel the following day. After last night he can't have been feeling all that great but Sasuke had trouble feeling sorry about that. The stupid moron hadn't made the connection between nature energy and the headaches so it was probably about time a lesson was taught. And no doubt by the end of the day this particular lesson was going to be taken to heart.

Although he didn't feel all that sorry he did find it hard to take too much pleasure in Naruto's torture though. In the morning he had kept up through sheer force of will but it was near noon now and he was obviously lagging behind. His face was bright red, sweat dripped off him and his breathing was harsh and ragged. Well perhaps he had already learned his lesson.

Sasuke stopped on the road and turned to face Naruto as he continued to trudge along towards him.

"Still feeling defiant?" Sasuke asked mildly.

Naruto squinted up at him as he got closer and Sasuke could tell that he was not only still in a decent amount of pain, but he was annoyed as well.

"I had my reasons," Naruto told him walking past and not stopping.

"Take a break."

"Don't need it," Naruto replied stubbornly.

"It wasn't a suggestion."

"And since when do you get to order me around!?" Naruto exclaimed, turning on him.

"Since you can't even be trusted to make decisions about your own well being perhaps?"

"Fine, I screwed up! You're not so perfect yourself you know."

It seemed like a snide and overly confident remark was required after that one but for some odd reason Sasuke just didn't feel up to it. If it was a competition in which one of them had done the most stupid things in the past Sasuke wasn't entirely sure he wanted to argue his point despite still being marginally confident that he would win.

Besides, Naruto really wasn't as angry as he appeared to be. He was in pain and frustrated with himself and lashing out at Sasuke was an attempt to make himself feel better. Sasuke knew the tactic well, it was something he knew he did often enough. But Naruto didn't generally act that way and it wasn't a behavior he wanted to reinforce.

"What was your reason?" he asked instead.

"What?" Naruto asked apparently derailed by the lack of further argument.

"You said you had a reason for doing it, what did you think might happen?"

"It doesn't matter," Naruto muttered looking away.

"If it was a good reason it might make me re-evaluate how stupid I think you really are. Slightly," Sasuke added with a smirk.

"I don't care what you think about me."

"Yes you do."

Naruto was practically swaying on his feet but at least he had stopped moving. So Sasuke took a seat on the side of the road as though taking a break for himself and sure enough Naruto joined him after a few indecisive moments.

"You don't really care, do you?"

"I'm a little curious," Sasuke allowed which was surprisingly true. He couldn't imagine what knowing would help, he also couldn't imagine how knowing might make either of them feel better because usually he wouldn't care. He should only care that Naruto stopped doing such stupid shit. But he supposed his curiosity was peaked because normally getting Naruto to share something was not such a great task.

Naruto used his shirt to mop the worst of the sweat off his face and frowned down at his feet for a few moments, apparently deciding whether or not to answer Sasuke's question.

Eventually he replied, "You don't need me."

Sasuke snorted at that. "That's hardly news."

Naruto turned his frown towards Sasuke, now looking a little pissed.

"Do you want me to explain or do you want to be a jerk?"

"I can't have both?"

Which was probably a bad thing to say because that comment caused Naruto's lips to clamp together and his gaze to flick away from Sasuke toward the road in front of them.

Sasuke remembered then when Naruto had made a comment about sharing things not being worth it because Sasuke had teased him afterwards. Apparently Naruto had indeed learned a lesson from that and while Sasuke wasn't particularly unhappy that Naruto might censor his every waking thought a little more in the future, such thinking might also have led to what was happening now.

Naruto had obviously been doing something he shouldn't have been doing and had kept it a secret from him because he'd learnt that sharing certain thoughts with Sasuke wasn't worth the fallout. It made Sasuke realize that he couldn't have it both ways, either they trusted one another without fear of repercussions or certain secrets might lead them down dangerous roads.

"I'm listening."

"Yeah well, I'm not talking."

"Don't be stubborn, I won't make fun of you."

Naruto finally looked back at him then, strangely surprised at his words. Sasuke wondered why such a simple statement would cause such a reaction.

"Okay. Look, you don't need me for this. I don't feel like I'm being real useful here. I thought if I got some power back you'd rely on me a little more."

Sasuke raised an eyebrow at that statement. That was the reason for all of this? It sounded very needy and Sasuke burned to make some sort of scathing comment but stopped himself in time. Well sort of.

"It's true, I don't need you."

Even though Naruto had said the same thing he still looked disappointed by the affirmation.

"But traveling together makes things easier." Sasuke forced himself to admit. "There are a lot of times traveling with you has made things more complicated and difficult but there are other times when it would have been more difficult without you."

Naruto looked downright shocked by the admission now but at least shocked was better than smug. This was hard enough as it was.

"Like what?" Naruto asked curiously.

"Your strange ability to charm almost every stranger you meet on the road has gleaned a lot of useful information I suppose. Your not completely worthless in a fight either."

Despite Sasuke's somewhat backhanded compliments Naruto was now smiling faintly at him.

"I guess you don't want to mention what might have happened with Lady Saito either," Naruto added.

"Never, actually."

"So I do contribute?"

"In your way. As I said, I don't need you. But then I don't think you especially need me either. It just makes things easier for both of us. Most of the time. When you aren't doing stupid shit."

"I thought you said you weren't going to make fun of me."

"And you believed me."

"Asshole, I-!"

Naruto's body went rigid, his hands flying up to hold his head as though trying to hold his brain inside. The pain hardly ever came on this suddenly and it must have felt like someone had just punctured his skull with a pickaxe by the way Naruto screamed in agony. This was just like last night, more than a headache and more like a physical attack.

Sasuke found himself on his knees in front of Naruto, grabbing at the hands Naruto was holding against his temples in an attempt to remove them so he could see Naruto's face.

"Naruto?!"

Naruto meanwhile just kept screaming and clutching at his head which was almost scary in itself.

Naruto had always had a high tolerance for pain and Sasuke had only heard him scream like this once before and that had been just last night. Then the pain had been so bad Naruto's nose had started bleeding and this seemed to go on for far longer.

But as fast as it had started, the screaming cut off abruptly. Naruto was still clutching at his head but Sasuke forced his arms down and tried to see his face which wasn't easy with Naruto's chin resting limply against his own chest like that.

"Naruto?"

Naruto drew a lungful of air in then like he hadn't taken a breath in for a while before slowly raising his head to look at Sasuke. Sasuke almost stopped breathing in that moment too. Naruto's eyes were red and slit vertically in an eerily familiar way. A corner of Naruto's mouth curled up showing a sharp pointed tooth which only served to make the half smile look that much more evil

"Not anymore," Kurama replied.

Sasuke let go of him quickly and scrambled back onto his feet. He watched a few paces away while Naruto slowly but smoothly got back to his feet and eyed him with definite malice

"Still here Uchiha?"

Sasuke didn't reply. He didn't know what was going on. He knew about Naruto's demon of course but he didn't understand how the thing could just take over Naruto's body if that was indeed what was happening now. He'd seen the fox cloak with his own eyes, he'd heard of Naruto changing form and growing feral with no understanding of what he was doing.

But he also happened to know that Naruto had since gained power over the Kyuubi and he'd thought the pair shared a symbolic bond now just like Killer Bee and his demon did. Of course Bee's demon wasn't the evil rampaging monster the Kyuubi could be.

"Don't hurt yourself Uchiha. I'll save you the effort of trying to work it out. Naruto can draw on my chakra which I can also do with his if he is for some reason unable to restrain me. But restraining me requires chakra and he no longer has control over his chakra."

"You're still trapped inside him," Sasuke observed warily. "I'm assuming if you had full use of your own chakra this wouldn't be the case."

The demon didn't seem to like being reminded of this. "My chakra is...limited right now, I have to use whatever energy I can. It's not ideal but this is better than nothing."

"The headaches he was having, it was you. He said he couldn't talk to you, that it was like you weren't there."

"Being restrained and chakra deprived has caused me to... sleep I guess would a good enough word to use. I guess he felt some pain as I woke up."

"Some pain? He was on his knees screaming!"

"Funny, I don't actually care. He's still alive in case you do care, he's sleeping right now. And he will stay that way until I figure out what to do next."

The fox had mentioned before that his power was limited. That was alarming in itself.

"Who the hell has the power to restrain your chakra apart from Naruto?"

The fox gave him that creepy half smile again. "You don't remember, do you?"

"No, tell me! Who did this to us?"

"You think the answer is one and the same to both of those questions but you are wrong. But it doesn't matter, I don't know why I am explaining anything to you anyway because here we part ways"

"What? No!" Sasuke said stepping forward and grabbing Naruto's shoulder as he turned away from him.

Naruto turned faster than Sasuke expected and grabbed the offending hand in a vice like grip. He squeezed it to the point where he was about to break Sasuke's fingers but Sasuke bit down his cry of pain.

"Don't misunderstand Uchiha," the fox warned him darkly. "I wanted you to die, but he was too soft hearted to get the job done. Stupidly he wants you to live and I will abide with this decision in deference to whatever bond we have. But it would not take much effort on your part to change my mind."

He let go of Sasuke's fingers and went to walk away again but Sasuke drew his sword and leveled it against the side of Naruto's neck applying just enough pressure to make the fox understand that he meant to use it.

"You think he wants this?"

The fox seemed unmoved by this threat. "Hah, you think you know him? Don't be so presumptuous. And besides, you said he didn't need you or you him. If travelling together only serves to make things moderately easier and this is the only reason you barely tolerate his company, why should you care if I walk away? I can't stand the sight of you, I can't imagine how he does."

"What?" Sasuke asked sharply.

"I know he has this deep affection for you that is blind to every act of evil stupidity you commit, it's disgusting. He is safer with me."

"I doubt it."

Those red eyes gazed at him for a few long moments and Sasuke got the uncomfortable feeling that those eyes could read his thoughts better than he could.

"Strange, I never considered that the feeling went both ways. I wouldn't have thought you capable."

Honestly neither did Sasuke and he wasn't sure that is exactly what is was now either. It was just that having a rampaging Kyuubi loose was not ideal to say the least.

"You think I like the idea of you being free? Besides, you stole the energy Naruto was drawing in, you can't keep in control without your own chakra. What do you think is going to happen when he gains control again?"

"I have a store of power now, it will last long enough to leave you in the dust."

"Why are you so eager to get him away from me?"

"Why are you so eager he stay?" Kurama countered.

Sasuke chose not to read into that too much.

"I don't trust you," Sasuke told him.

"Good. I don't think you understand just how much I want to see you dead."

"Ditto," Sasuke replied darkly, putting just that little bit more pressure on the blade.

"I suppose the threat is the same, you would kill Naruto to stop me from leaving. But you have to know it isn't going to be easy killing him. Limited I may be right now, but I can use Naruto's strength in ways he cannot. I could finish breaking your hand and leave you in the dirt before you could cut his throat and I think you realize this."

"Then you also have to know that it wouldn't stop me from trying again. I'm persistent."

"True enough, I'll give you that. So I could break your neck instead."

"You could try. How sure are you that you can kill me before I disable Naruto? You don't want me to hurt him, I know that much."

"Even if I do let him wake up again, I can control him again anytime. He has no way to properly restrain me without his chakra. You could never trust him again. You still want him back?"

"Better him than you."

Kurama seemed to be thinking this over but eventually he said, "You're only alive because of him. You really want to test the bond we have that much?"

"You really care about him, don't you?" Sasuke asked with some surprise. Naruto had told him they'd bonded but he hadn't really believed how much till now.

"As much as I hate it, I don't want to cause him more pain," Kurama reluctantly confessed. Although he'd looked almost disgusted with himself for admitting it.

"So what do you think Naruto would want right now?"

"Certainly not what is best for him," Kurama muttered. "Fine. I will give him back, for now. But I am awake now, and I will get what I want as soon as Naruto realizes you are not worth protecting anymore. It will only be a matter of time."

"If he hasn't realized it by now, I think you're in for a long wait," Sasuke predicted with a smug half smile when he realized he'd just won.

One moment Naruto's head was held high, a deep resonating voice floating out of his mouth, the next moment he slumped just a little and then jumped and yelped when he noticed Sasuke's blade resting against his throat.

"What the fuck Sasuke?" Naruto asked alarmed moving away from the blade and turning to face him.

Naruto's eyes were that familiar blue, he looked freaked out but normal.

"We need to talk," Sasuke told him.


Naruto was understandably in a little bit of shock when Sasuke filled him in on what had happened as they continued to sit by the side of the road. Naruto did not seem to remember a single detail of what had happened while he hadn't been in control, which was odd considering Kurama had quoted part of a conversation he'd been having with Naruto moments before making his appearance.

"So you were right," Naruto concluded at the end. "I ended up feeding Kurama. But I don't get it, he's a chakra being, how can he use nature energy?"

"You use internal chakra but can still utilize nature energy. Perhaps it learnt it from you or perhaps he already knew how. But that isn't what is important right now."

"What is?"

"I think your demon might know what happened to us."

Naruto didn't look convinced though. "If he knew, he would have said. There's no good reason to keep it a secret if it would help us to know."

"The Kyuubi might have a reason it deems good enough. But since you still can't communicate directly with it we're not likely to be able to convince it to share if it doesn't want to. It's not going to talk to me "

Naruto winced. "I didn't realize he hated you that much. Don't think he's real big on Uchiha's in general though."

"That's hardly surprising."

"So... is all this good news or bad news?" Naruto asked uncertainly.

"I don't know," Sasuke admitted. "I suppose it depends on how much truth there is in wanting to keep you safe. If the Kyuubi acts to keep you alive I suppose that could be valuable. However, if it decides that keeping you happy at the same time is less of a priority it could decide just to up and leave in the middle of the night. And no matter what you say about this understanding you share, I don't think it's morals are as keen as yours are. We don't know what it would do if left to it's own devices. We don't even know what it is capable of being limited the way it is."

"I think you're worrying too much," Naruto told him. "He'd never just take me over for no good reason. You might not see it, but I think he only did it this time because he was trying to protect me."

"From me," Sasuke clarified.

"Well yeah, I guess. But he just doesn't know you like I do. Give him time, he'll come to trust you too."

"I doubt it," Sasuke predicted.

"There is some good news," Naruto told him steadfastly trying to look on the bright side. "My head doesn't hurt anymore, not even a little. I checked that scar on my side earlier too and it's starting to fade already. That's gotta be a bonus."

"We'll see," Sasuke replied unconvinced.

But somehow he had a very bad feeling about this new turn of events.

TBC in Part 12