"Narutoooo!" Sakura screamed, leaping toward them with Jakku at her heels. She knelt next to Sasuke, her face set with furious determination, as Jakku checked for Naruto's pulse. Sakura put her ear to Sasuke's lips and two fingers to his neck, then gasped. No breath, no pulse. By the expression on Jakku's face, Naruto was the same.

With a soft sob, she placed one hand on Sasuke's heart, the other over his lungs. Green chakra enveloped her hands. Jakku did the same to Naruto. By manipulating her chakra, she forced his lungs to inhale and exhale. One breath, then another, another... His heart still refused to beat.

"Don't you leave me!" she cried, shocking his heart with chakra. "You hear me, Sasuke?! Don't you die!" She shocked him again. His body lurched upward, but still his heart remained still. She forced more oxygen into his failing body. Still no reaction. Another shock. His eyes shot open, but he stared without seeing her. Maybe he was too far gone.

"Gah!" Jakku grunted as he shocked Naruto's prone body. "Come on, Naruto! Breathe! Breathe! You have to! Come on!" He listened for a heartbeat. Nothing. "Why won't he -" Jakku stopped short as he forced Naruto to exhale. Blood and black liquid splattered his hands and arms as he did - it burned like fire.

"Venom!" he gasped. Now it all made sense. The poison was negating every breath, shock, and chakra boost he gave Naruto. The holes in his arms were the entry points!

"Sakura!" he cried in desperation. "Leave his heart! Just focus on purifying his blood! Orochimaru's venom's what's killing them! She gasped, keeping a hand on Sasuke's lungs and placing the other in the hole in his chest. As her chakra flowed through his veins, his entire body, even his eyes, shone neon green. A black liquid began collecting in a sphere in the palm of her hand.

"Come on, Sasuke! Please!" she begged as she pulled the last of the poison - nearly two pints - from his blood. "You can't leave me! Not now! Please, I - I love you!" She gave him one final burst of chakra. If this didn't work, it was too late. She placed a trembling hand to his throat and laid her head on his chest - all that met her ears was silence. The world seemed to crumble around her. A cry of sorrow escaped her lips, a voice distant and broken. Was it her screaming, or someone else? He was gone. He could never come back. Her friends, her best friends, had deserted her. Her soul broke with theirs. Her mind stretched higher, higher, ever higher, into the cold space of her endless grief.

"Why, Sasuke?!" she screamed into the rain. "Why?!" She froze as a dull throb touched her fingertips. She listened, unsure. Then another beat, and, hesitantly, another.

Ga-thump... Ga-thump... Ga-thump...

She pressed and ear to Sasuke's chest. A soft, drumming pulse touched her ear, faint but constant. Small, ragged gasps of air pierced the silence between his heartbeats. Sasuke was alive! Sakura pressed her hands to his chest once more, pulling the blood from his lungs and allowing him to breathe. He blinked in confusion, then groaned.

"S... Sakura... is it - unh!" he gasped in pain as his wounds throbbed. She touched a finger to his lips.

"Shh. Save your strength for healing." He nodded. Then his eyes widened. All of the shinobi from his childhood, all of his friends, were beside him in an instant, smiling and crying and laughing all at once. His eyes filled with years. All but one.

"Where... is Naruto?" Sakura flinched. He followed her gaze to the prone, lifeless form beneath Jakku's hands. All visible emotion left Sasuke's eyes. A choking sound escaped his throat. One tear flowed down his face as he stood with shaking legs. Sakura tried to grab him.

"Sasuke, y-" He punched her in the stomach with a speed unnatural even for him, sending her flying thirty feet away and into the cliffside. Even as the others rushed to help her, their limbs froze, immobilized. A tall, pale figure approached Sasuke and extended a hand toward him, touching his face and smiling gently. Sasuke flinched.

"You poor thing," he crooned. "Haven't you learned your lesson yet?" He extended a bony finger and touched Sasuke's curse mark, which had faded to a dull brown. It burned red under his touch. Sasuke screamed, but his limbs refused to move. "You can never escape me. Because, dear boy," he paused to take a breath and pulled his face off. Sasuke gasped - he was staring at a perfect image of himself! "You are me!"

"No! NOOOOOO!" Sasuke screamed. "Uhn - unh - AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!" Pain seared his body and gave him the sensation of being rent in two. Fire sprouted from his shoulder over his curse mark, burning the skin around it. With a sound like ripping paper, his second-state wings ripped through his skin. Strangely, fire erupted from the same point on Orochimaru's shoulder. He screamed in pain as well. As the second wing sprouted from his back, Sasuke saw Orochimaru double over and clutch his chest, coughing up a river of blood. Suddenly a wave of Orochimaru's thoughts pushed into his mind.

"The boy... The connection is breaking! If he... cuts it, I -"

"That's it!" Sasuke cried. He focused his last reserves of energy to his palm, drawing strength from the fear he sensed in Orochimaru's black heart. A current of blue lightning enveloped his palm. This was his last shot. This was what would save him - if it didn't kill him first. Orochimaru gasped.

"No, you fool!" he screamed. "You rotten -" His words were cut off as he saw the smirk across Sasuke's lips.

"I," he began, "am not..." He glared, took a deep breath, and shoved the Chidori into his curse mark. "YOU!" Black venom sprayed from the mark, dripping over his chest and shoulders. With a sound like breaking glass, the wings shattered, dropping to the ground in pieces. His skin lost its gray tint as the venom left his body. Orochimaru sank to the ground.

"Damn you, Sasuke Uchiha!" he screamed. "Damn you to hell!" Sasuke smirked, exhausted.

"Write me when you get there." With a tired sigh, he drew his blade one last time, lifting it above his head. With a small squelch, he drove it into Orochimaru's heart.

"You little -" he began. But his words were never uttered. Orochimaru sank to the ground, all life gone from his eyes. As Sasuke looked on, his body glowed with a white light - strange for someone with such a dark soul. With a shudder, his body split in two at the chest. White orbs rose into the air from his body, ascending far into the heavens above and vanishing. One passed through Sasuke as it rose, and a small voice entered his mind, radiating absolute happiness through his mind.

"Thank you," it whispered. "Thank you." Sasuke realized what it was. A soul - one of the souls imprisoned by Orochimaru's body transference. That could only mean one thing - he was free. Sasuke felt a breeze ruffle his hair. The sky above him had cleared, and a beam of white light warmed his face. Two final orbs left Orochimaru's body - one black and one orange. The black one sprouted a tail of flame and descended into the earth with a hiss. Sasuke grinned.

"Goodbye, Master." The orange orb floated over the grass toward Naruto and hovered over his face for a moment. Then it sank into his chest with a small rustle, like waving grass. Naruto gasped and opened his eyes, blinking in confusion.

"Sasuke..." he whispered.

"Are you okay," asked Sasuke, sinking to his knees and smiling, "you loser?" His eyes lost their vision, and he slumped to the ground. He felt a pair of strong hands lift him up. A woman's voice broke into his mind.

"Sasuke! Thank God he's all right! And Naruto..." The voice faded from his mind. He was tired. He wanted nothing more than to sleep for the next thousand years. One final thought permeated his failing consciousness.

"I did it... Brother... I avenged... our clan... The Uchihas... will survive..."