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Title: Taboo

Fandom: Naruto

Author: Shi-koi

Warnings: Shonen-ai/Yaoi/BL. Romance. Angst-ish-y stuff. Bad language. Lots of it. (Naruto had a few bad words when he gets mad/upset etc). Violence (as per usual), sporadic action (may decrease then increase as the story progresses). Tissue warning. AU. Dimension-hop.

Rating: R

Genre: Romance, angst, action.

Pairings: ItaNaru. Mentions of previous SasuNaru before Naruto crosses over. May have other minor pairings. I'm not listing every little possibility. Heh. That would give the game away.

Summary: [ItaNaru] When Naruto ends up in another world very similar to his own, where the Yondaime is alive and the Uchiha clan is thriving, he finds out that sometimes, the last things we ever want to see are the truths we are faced with. Previous SasuNaruSasu mentioned. Action. Romance. Violence.

Feedback: Hell yes! Good, bad, ugly. I'm curious. Let me know regardless.

Disclaimer: Not mine. ::breaks down and cries::

Notes: Because I've always wanted to write this pairing, and I wanted to know if I could do it. Pure writers' curiosity. That's all. Yep. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. ::blows raspberry::

Naruto is 17. AU-Arashi is 26. AU-Kakashi is 19. AU-Itachi is 16. AU-Sasuke is 11. All other relevant ages are as standard.

Fic Notes: In the AU, Arashi never had to fight the Kyuubi, it didn't exist, so he wasn't killed. He never had a son and so he took on Itachi as a sort of apprentice. With someone outside of his clan to take charge and test himself on, Itachi never went down that dark path. He is a Jounin, and an Anbu captain though, who answers only to the Yondaime. The Uchiha clan is still large and thriving.

Naruto never found out who his father was, so he has no idea that in his universe, the Yondaime was his dad.

Writing Playlist: 'Itsuwari no Musette', 'Madrigal', 'Bois de Merveilles', 'GARDENIA' and 'Syunikiss' by Malice Mizer, 'Kimi Ga Matteiru Kara', 'Kimi no Tameni Dekiru Koto (6th Day)' and 'Sayonara' by Gackt, 'Crucify My Love', 'Rusty Nail' and 'Kurenai' by X Japan. 'Hisoka ~ Norowareta Tsukiya no Kioku' and 'Tsuzuki Asato' from Yami no Matsuei OST I ~ Hiro no Tsuki ~. 'Pulse ~Whenever~' by Okiayu Ryuutaro from the DNAngel Vocal Collection. 'Anywhere' by Avantasia, 'Is There Anybody There', 'Send Me An Angel', 'Moments Of Glory' and 'You And I' by the Skorpions, 'Beautiful People' by Marilyn Manson, 'Verdammt Ich Lieb Dich' by Mathias Reim, 'Schwarz' by die prinzen (Weiss Kreuz). 'Bokura no Boken' by Kids Alive from the Hikaru no Go soundtrack. 'Clint Eastwood' and 'Dracula' by Gorillaz. 'Engel', 'Du Hast', 'Der Meister' and 'Wollt Lhr Das Bett in Flammen' by Rammstein. 'Prendre Racine' by Calogero. 'Protege Moi' by Placebo. 'I Don't Know You Anymore' by Savage Garden.



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EXTRA: I wasn't sure about writing this as a Shonen-ai/Yaoi/BL fic, but halfway through the second chapter my partner made a comment about one of the lines and said that it sounded as though Itachi had a thing for Naruto. I was stunned, to put it mildly.

Then we had an argument about all the characters on Naruto actually being gay. I laughed and said that was ridiculous.

He then pointed out that with all the teams being three-man units was just begging for emotional attachments. He asked me if I'd ever noticed that in the army the smallest units were always a minimum of six-man teams (occasionally four - but that was rare). I said no. He said that was so there were no 'Inappropriate attachments', since being in close quarters with a small team for a long period of time will have a profound effect on the members of the team.

He said that, especially in life and death situations, people become closer, and that in Naruto there was more than enough evidence to support that there could be more than one relationship going on behind the scenes.

He said that it certainly seemed as though Sasuke and Naruto had something going on, things were too intense between them for anything else, and that Ino and Sakura were prime Shoujo-ai/Yuri candidates - which I have to agree with, especially since Ino had a rather large fixation on Sakura for quite some time. (As a side note, I adore this pairing and story addresses are more than welcome)

I asked if he thought everyone was gay.

Then, out of all the damn luck in the universe...an hour later we were watching Dr Who (with Christopher Eccleston as The Doctor) and Captain Jack bloody damn well kissed the Doctor (full on the lips properly) after kissing Rose. Guess who had a laughing fit at me and said that his point was thus proven right.

I stand corrected. All of the Naruto cast is, in fact, gay. Bent as a six-pound note, as my other half likes to say.

~Shi-koi~

(Who now has another two dozen damn plot-bunnies running around in her brain)





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Prologue



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01-verse





The Three Legendary Sannin were together again on the same battleground. Two on one side, fighting to protect their dearest, precious people, and on the other, the one with the invading army. Fighting to destroy what was not his.



Two and a half months of minor skirmishes along Konoha's bordering wall and the surrounding forest had everyone tense and agitated, most half-expecting this final conflict, some eagerly anticipating the upcoming battle if for no other reason than to have a decisive end to the fighting.



Leaf shinobi lined the top of the wall around the main gates, black and green visible on every available point. Others were hidden in their positions, some in the meadow beside two gigantic creatures, some hidden in the trees on Konohas' side.



Opposite them were two equally large creatures, surrounded by ninja with the Sound symbol on their hitae-ate. Black and grey covered the forest and grass beside the Snake Sannin, their numbers easily three time those of the Leaf.



As if from an unseen signal the fighting started. Figures blurred across the battleground, red blood spraying across the green of the grass and leaves. Traps explodes, the ground shook, fire blazed across the earth, leaving huge furrows in which the bodies they left behind still smoked.



The battle was mostly silent, punctuated by the occasional scream of agony or the yell of a jutsu. Everyone here knew what to expect. Dirty tricks, Ninjutsu, Genjutsu, Taijutsu and just plain sheer luck made the battle what it was.



Within Konoha's main living area, people were silently evacuated to the hidden caves and tunnels, then moved to the secret places that no-one other than the Hokage knew about. They had to create a new area for the people to hide, since their enemies had once been of the Leaf. Orochimaru knew every tunnel, every cave, every evacuation point. Even the newer ones were unsafe since Uchiha Sasuke's defection back to Orochimaru's side.



On the back of a massive slug that guarded the area just before the gates stood two people. A woman with blonde hair and a slender pink-haired girl. Next to them was an equally massive orange toad with two males standing on his head. One white-haired, one blonde, both of them with their hair in long pony-tails that blew in the wind.



On the other side Orochimaru stood on the head of an enormous snake with Kabuto, his silver-haired assistant, the huge salamander beside him had only one black-haired red-eyed figure. Sasuke.



There was a lull in the fighting as the long lizard's tail slashed out into the ninja below, most of them jumping to safety. The few who didn't were sliced into two by the force and speed of the blow. The snake slid forward beside the other creature.



Sakura turned to the blonde-haired woman beside her, her green eyes dark and hard. "Hokage-sama, it's not safe for you any more."



Tsunade, the Godaime nodded, she'd expected her apprentice to say something to her soon. Her place now was not on the battlefield, she was still needed to guide and heal her shinobi. One leap took her off the back of the slug and onto the city wall.



Sakura wore the same Anbu uniform as Naruto, the mask pushed to rest on her hair was that of a laughing butterfly with many bright colours. It was a marked contrast to Naruto's own crimson slashed white of a grinning fox.



"Naruto!" Sakura called across the gap between them, "Now!" She pulled her mask down at the same time as Naruto, his own blue eyes long since having been stained a bloody red from the fever of battle.



Naruto nodded once curtly, before hopping off the head of the giant toad, leaving Jiraiya standing in the wake of the blast of air his jump caused. He came down mid-field with a large blue rasengan in each palm, a screaming battle-cry echoing loudly across the bloody field.



He landed with an almost anti-climatic silence, and a delay of three seconds before the power in the the two rasengan exploded outward, shredding the earth into the air, large shards of rock slicing through the air and into the enemy, the sheer mass of them unable for most of the Sound to avoid.



The Leaf shinobi fell back to their places, carrying as many wounded off the battlefield as they could.



In the centre of the torn, red and destroyed meadow Naruto stood, a slowly growing crimson-hued glow encompassing his body. His fingers lengthened into claws. Beneath the mask fangs grew, his eyes narrowed into purple-ruby slits and his whiskers deepened and darkened.



He was the distraction, the main heavy weapon of the Leaf. Behind him Sakura was getting into position to fight Sasuke, the slug beneath her having come out at her summoning. Jiraiya was on his other side, preparing to fight Orochimaru and Kabuto.



Gamabunta shook his head, settling himself lightly on the ground, his long dagger-like weapon already out of it's sheath. "Just like old times, eh?"



"Yeah." Jiraiya agreed, crossing his arms on Gamabunta's head, "Just like old times."



The boss toad rolled his eyes over to the girl on the slug beside him, that was new. "You think she can deal?"



Jiraiya laughed. "If she's anything like Tsunade...yeah. She can deal."



Gamabunta snorted. He looked down on the field to where Naruto was changing. "Too young," he said with a sigh. "They're all just too young."



"Naruto's strong. You know that. The kid'll find some way to do what he needs to do." Jiraiya said, his voice sounding as tired as Gamabunta's own sigh.



Below them Naruto had finished changing. His long blonde hair whipped around in the wind, spiky blonde bangs covering the mask above his eyes. He snarled ferally, the low-pitched growl shearing the nerves of those that heard it.



It was an inhuman sound, made by an inhuman creature.



A large mass of Sound shinobi leapt into action, coming from all directions to attack the blonde creature. Flashes of grey and black blurred around his unmoving figure. From beneath him the earth trembled, before the soil blasted outward from one ninjas' summoning of a pack of dogs? Wolves?



One swipe of a sharp-clawed hand send the animals flying across the field where they landed heavily before disappearing in a puff of smoke back to where they came from.



A deep rumble grew in Naruto's chest as he suddenly surged upwards, his feet lashing out one way, his hands twisting around with the movements of his body to create a miniature tornado in the centre of the oncoming Sound shinobi.



Screaming could be heard as a large rasengan suddenly flashed at the top.



Naruto let himself fall, the wind howling around him as he forced the rasengan into the wind caused by his movements. Those shinobi unlucky enough to be trapped inside the grip of the tornado's unrelenting grip were soon shredded.



The blonde landed with a loud thud in a crouch, the bodies or pieces landing messily around him. Naruto stood slowly, his eyes flashing as he was suddenly attacked again by the Sound army.



The Leaf took their chances around Naruto, leaving a wide berth around him, made in part by the bodies littering their path. They took the edges of the battlefield, taking out those who didn't notice them coming.



On the back of the giant scarlet and black salamander, Sasuke waited patiently for Orochimaru to give the signal for him to attack. His red sharingan gaze was icy and hard, all traces of his past buried beneath his thirst for power, power that the snake Sannin had promised.



He watched as Naruto changed, a part of him breathless at the sheer power contained within the blonde's body. Power that he wanted, power that he had jealously tried to keep for himself, but ultimately, power that he knew would never be his.



Sasuke had felt dwarfed by Naruto's seemingly endless strength and growth potential. It had, at those times he was truly honest to himself, scared the hell out of him.



Their shinobi were no match for a demon-augmented human like Naruto, the younger ninja having long since learnt to control the massive chakra reserves of the Kyuubi.



Sasuke's eyes flickered over to Orochimaru, watching the fascination on the snake Sannin's face as he saw his own troops ripped to shreds by the young blonde. There was a half-smile on his lips, and his eyes gleamed with anticipation.



Kabuto was as quietly smug as usual, not questioning his own strength or the strength of his master.



Sasuke looked upwards just in time to catch Orochimaru's signal, sending the beast below him directly towards his target. The main gates.



He could hear the shouts and crashes as Gamabunta met Manda head-on, Orochimaru and Kabuto engaging in a personal battle with Jiraiya. His own position was quickly intercepted by his pink-haired ex-teammate, on the back of one of Tsunade's slugs. He could sense the chakra surrounding her and the slug, his lips pulling taut as he realised that this time she'd summoned the creature herself. She'd grown while he'd been away, and now he didn't know what she was capable of. He'd heard that she'd been trained with Naruto intensively while he'd been away, but this new Sakura who wore black, who dressed the same as any other Anbu, who didn't speak to him, was not a Sakura he was used to.



He saw her lean down into the wind, just barely managing to get the salamander to dodge from the acid which was spat out from the slug's wide jaws. He ordered the creature to twist, slashing with it's razor-sharp tail.



The speed of the slug was belied by it's size, but it was still too slow to get out of the way. The tail ripped through the slug's body, sending white slime flying.



Sasuke ducked and spun round, dodging with neat efficacy the shuriken which whizzed past his head, cutting off a fraction of a strand of hair.



Then Sakura was flying towards him, a handful of kunai in one fist, the other making seals. His eyes automatically cataloged the seals, his mind putting together the combination and possibilities, until he saw that nothing happened. He danced out of the way of her landing, sending his own weapons out to her, a few of his own shuriken and kunai.



Sakura spun around, sending a half-dozen senbon flying past him, he smirked, leaning just out of the way with smooth, economical movements. Sakura didn't move. Sasuke felt something on the back of his neck and jumped out of the way, rolling away and to his feet.



The senbon she'd thrown were circling back to him, seemingly controlled by Sakura's chakra. He'd seen something similar a long time ago.



He activated his complete Sharingan, tracking the needles with his eyes. It was a sudden burst of chakra which caught his attention, just in time to see Sakura's fist land in the centre of the salamander's head, hard enough to puncture the skin and make it bleed.



The salamander screamed, it's body jerking back and forth. It was wounded, but not out of the fight. Sakura jumped back onto the slug as a vicious stream of fire erupted from the salamander's jaws. Two of the shuriken Sasuke threw through the fire landed, scoring wounds across her side and right leg.



Sasuke dodged the senbon again, making a rapid set of seals as he did so, sending the senbon far out of range. A second set of seals were completed just in time to counter Sakura's next attack, a set of bunshin inside a genjutsu.



Sasuke smirked. The bunshin were easy for him to see through, and the genjutsu was no match for his sharingan. His fist struck out and he spun on the spot, hitting back out with his foot. He collided with flesh, and was gratified to hear a muffled scream as his hits landed.



His hand flashed out and grabbed Sakura just as the genjutsu fell. He pulled her towards him and pulled off the mask, staring with poorly concealed amusement into her bitter green eyes.



"Always the worst one out of the three of us, Sakura." Sasuke said mockingly.



Sakura tried to tug her wrist from his hand, sending him a dirty look. "I don't know what I ever saw in you. You're nothing more than a traitor, Uchiha."



"Naruto didn't think so did he?"



If possible, Sakura's eyes became even harder than flint. She snatched her wrist out of his hand so fast the bones snapped. "Don't you dare talk about Naruto, you utter bastard!"



Sasuke clenched his jaw. "I can talk about whomever the fuck I like, Sakura-chan." Sasuke mimicked.



Sakura's free hand flashed into another set of seals, the whorls on Sasuke's eyes twirling as he copied them.



There was a brief flare of Chakra, and suddenly Sasuke could feel a thin stream of chakra leak out from his fingertips. It was useless and very annoying, feeling like an unscratchable itch.



Sakura darted forward, and Sasuke automatically parried with a kunai, feeling a small amount of shock when the kunai sliced in two at her touch. He darted out of reach, feeling the salamander's muscles bunch as it fought the slug, acid splashing on the thick hide and slowly burning away at the skin.



Sasuke waited until the salamander turned suddenly, using the momentum of the bunched muscles to give him a lift as he blurred forward to Sakura, unsheathing the sword slung across his back and slashing forward in a smooth movement.



He hit Sakura across the abdomen, the sword slicing cleanly through her before a puff of smoke left him with a wooden log in her place. He spun around on his heel, the sword sliding quickly out of the wood to meet her sudden black-gloved fist, a light sheen of chakra covering her arm and hand like a shield.



The impact drove him back, and a spark of excitement lit in his belly at the sheer strength in her punch. Her breath came in small, harsh pants, but he was as yet unwinded. Her arm with the broken wrist hung limply at her side, and Sasuke took the opportunity to slash at her unprotected side, scoring a long, shallow wound across her arm and continuing across her stomach.



Sakura fell back, her good arm clutching at the deepest point of the wound on her other arm, the chakra around her fist sealing the wound.



The two ex-teammates stared at each other, waiting for the other to move.



Across the battlefield Jiraiya was dodging a hit from Kabuto, the silver-haired youth covered in long bloody scores from a defensive maneuver by the toad Sannin, the elders' hair having been used as a weapon, every strand of his long hair suddenly as hard as steel and as sharp as a needle.



Orochimaru was breathing heavily, forming seals before blurring to Jiraiya's other side, his sword stabbing forward into Jiraiya's back through the hair.



Jiraiya grunted from the impact before lashing out, his kick hitting the snake Sannin in the face. He leapt back onto Gamabunta's head, his hand moving in seals just in time to ignite the stream of oil which shot out from the boss toad's throat.



Tsunade watched from her vantage point as the bloody battle continued. They were heavily outnumbered, but they were all dedicated and fighting to protect their home. That gave them an edge to use. The battle was pretty much even.



An explosion in the centre of the battlefield suddenly swiveled almost every head capable of moving. Red chakra lashed out in ever-increasing waves from a figure lying prone on the ground, a long tail of hair, stained crimson from the blood lay around his head, his limbs in positions which just looked wrong.



Tsunade found her breath caught in her throat. "Naruto..."



Sakura paused in her attack, leaping back, her eyes showing dread as she caught sight of the person who'd become her best friend. "No. Naruto!"



Sasuke couldn't breathe. It was one thing to want to fight the fox-boy, to beat his rival into the ground, but to see him just lying there, broken... Naruto. I thought you were stronger. I need you to be stronger. I'm the one who will defeat you!



Jiraiya couldn't take the time to look, but the dread feeling in his stomach spread. Kabuto met his eyes as Orochimaru glanced over to the demon-child. "Somehow, I expected more from him."



Jiraiya retreated to a safe distance before gazing across the bloodied earth to the unmoving youth he'd taken as an apprentice.



Naruto's legs twitched, before cracking and bending back into place painfully, the bones re-setting into place. His right arm, which looked half torn off started to re-form, the bone setting itself, muscles, sinew and tendons fixing themselves as they watched.



The ground trembled. Naruto pushed himself to his knees. His Anbu mask was cracked in three places, part of the upper right side completely missing, revealing one dark crimson eye with a slit purple pupil.



Naruto staggered to his feet, his arms hanging down, and he swayed unsteadily. Two sound shinobi took the opportunity to leap past the flailing red chakra tails - only to stop mid-air as the chakra literally sliced them apart.



His eyes unseeing, Naruto lifted an arm and slashed out at the enemy which stood nearly twenty meters away, the wave of chakra from his fists incinerating them before they could blink. He took a step forward and fell to his knees, coughing out a mouth-full of blood, the red liquid bubbling to leak out from under the mask.



Someone breathed, and suddenly Naruto's head snapped up and a low growl reverberated across the silent ravaged meadow. He screamed in pure, unadulterated anger, the chakra tails increasing until he covered two-thirds of the open ground.



The Leaf shinobi fell back, leaving the field clear except for Orochimaru's troops.



Black lightning arched through the terrifying chakra surrounding Naruto, flashing upwards in an ever-higher attempt to touch the sky.



Naruto changed again, his mask sliding off to fall, broken, at his knees, his ears moving up and becoming red-tinged triangles of fur, his Anbu uniform ripped just above his tailbone and a bloody pair of yellow-tipped reddish tails flicked outwards, covered in a thin membrane of slime and a white liquid, as though they had just been birthed.



Naruto screamed again, the sound drumming into the very earth and another tail ripped it's way out from behind him.



His features lengthened and elongated until he looked more animal than human, his legs cracking and changing into something half-way between a human and that of a fox. His arms sprouted fur and his hands curled forward slightly. His Anbu uniform lay in shreds around him, a strip of black protecting his modesty, and some scraps of black hanging off his shoulders.



Then he moved.



Before anyone could move, breathe or blink, the Naruto-creature was halfway across the field, his tails snapping outward in deadly attacks of their own accord, a streak of red all that was visible as he sped across the bloodied earth to annihilate his enemies.



Sound shinobi fell like flies, most too slow to grasp their weapons before the devil took them. Claws flashed, the ground shook and the black-lined red chakra captured everything within reach and burnt it in many flashes of black-hued red light.



Within seconds, over three quarters of the Sound army was completely decimated, and a single figure stood on the battlefield.



Orochimaru gave a signal, and the Sound fell back, including his own apprentice, Sasuke.



Tsunade gave her own signal, calling her shinobi back to the wall around her.



"Shit!"



The Godaime turned towards the voice besides her, recognising the dog mask with the lolling red tongue. "Kiba?"



The Anbu nodded.



"What's wrong."



"He's losing control."



Tsunade frowned. She'd seen Naruto change before during an attempted attack during a genin graduation from the academy. The threat to the children and their families enough to send him into a dangerous fury. The only casualties were the attackers from the Sound, but it was a sight none would ever forget. Twice since then he'd had to change his form, although never to this extent.



The repercussions were still being felt.



"Naruto never lost control before." Tsunade argued.



"Yeah. But he's got three tails now." Kiba turned when Akamaru barked from behind him. He nodded in agreement to whatever it was that Akamaru shared with him. "And that sound he's making - not good."



"Shit." Tsunade echoed Kiba's sentiment. "We can't do anything while they're still out there."



"Hokage-sama?"



Tsunade turned. "Yes?"



Hyuuga Hinata stood there, holding her mask in one hand. "I think you need to look, Hokage-sama." Hinata pointed to where the Sound had retreated to, all of them except the two large summons were left on the field. They were making their way to Naruto's position, Jiraiya and Sakura moving as fast as they could to intercept them.



Gamabunta was the closest, and could get to Naruto first, but the slug summon Sakura stood on was still trying to re-form from the smaller slugs she had been fired into.



Two against one odds weren't good, even worst when you counted the humans controlling the summons. Three on one, and two of them could be considered experts at what they did.



Gamabunta landed with a minor quake and a cloud of dust a few meters in front of Naruto. Jiraiya took one look at the vacant expression on Naruto's face and cursed. The kid was obviously lost inside his own mind, probably trying to control the source of the chakra.



The Kyuubi was obviously being difficult.



Flashes of indistinct rage and madness flitted across Naruto's face as he fought the Kyuubi in his mind, forcing his will over the foxes' own.



Jiraiya stood on Gamabunta's head, looking slightly worse for wear. His massive mane of white hair was red-soaked and his face showed tension from the pain he was in. The toad Sannin still stood proud and tall, his entire frame declaring his intent to stop Orochimaru and his subordinates.



He ignored the scream of indistinct sounds from behind him, his attention firmly on his old teammate. Jiraiya wavered slightly when the Uchiha brat closed in on a large salamander summon, trying to keep his eyes on both creatures and the three on them.



Jiraiya felt Gamabunta shift beneath him, and he moved with the muscles on the toad, preparing for the inevitable confrontation. He could see the slug on the other side of the battlefield trying to heal herself as fast as she could so she could join the upcoming fight, but years of experience told him that she and Sakura would never get here in time.



Orochimaru readied his sword and leapt forward, his body stretching at an impossibly fast speed. Kabuto found his way to the other side, splitting Jiraiya's concentration.



Jiraiya jumped back and dodged Orochimaru's hit, twisting and hitting forward in a counter to one of Kabuto's strikes.



Blood dotted the head of the toad as they fought, and Gamabunta swiped with his bulbous tongue at Manda, slashing with his dagger at the other creature, dodging the enormous fangs on the snake as he moved.



On the ground the chakra was receding, being compacted into a bright corona around Naruto's body.



Sasuke jumped down, landing in a crouch before Naruto's seemingly oblivious form. He stood slowly, long, slender limbs gracefully straightening. He stared at the blonde before him, a frown marring his brow.



"Oi. Naruto."



Naruto still didn't move, much less show any sign that he'd heard Sasuke.



Sasuke's frown deepened. He looked upwards to the fight between the two Sannin and Kabuto. All three of them were engrossed in the fight.



"Sa-sa...su..."



Sasuke crouched down in front of Naruto. "Naruto?" His hand readied to set the seals he'd use if Naruto was bluffing, his other hand reaching behind him to ready the end of the razor wire he was so fond of.



Naruto lifted his head a fraction, just enough so Sasuke could see the ruby eyes gaze at the earth. "Why...? Why Sasuke? You...betrayed...me."



"I..." What could he say? Sasuke knew he had betrayed his once best friend. What could he say? 'Sorry, but power was...is...more important to me than you.'



Naruto's eyes flickered to an almost-blue before reverting back again. "You...you..." his voice trembled between his normal tone and an animalistic growl, "betrayed me. You..."



Sasuke snapped his wrist outwards on Naruto's last word, wrapping the wire around Naruto's chest, pinning his arms to his body. "Sorry Naruto. But this needs to be done." Sasuke said flatly. He tugged on the end of the wire, yanking Naruto down to fall on his chest before Sasuke, who stood again slowly.



His hands quickly formed the seals Orochimaru had drummed into him, each of his five fingers on his right hand lighting up with an eerie blue-green glow. He kicked Naruto over, ignoring the groan of pain and the harsh panting breaths from the still exhausted and only half-aware blonde, thrusting his hand down into Naruto's stomach over his seal.



The seals burnt into Naruto's bare flesh, and the younger of them screamed, his senses being torn forcefully back to the present. Self-awareness returned to Naruto and he coughed out another mouthful of blood.



The seal of the Kyuubi flashed red, before a set of symbols in black crept outwards from Sasuke's fingers, turning the seal black and flat.



"Sas...uke?"



Sasuke looked into Naruto's eyes, looking away at the forming seal and away from the hurt and confusion in Naruto's eyes.



"I'm just doing what needs to be done, Naruto." Sasuke whispered, waiting until the seal finished forming, the black tendrils circling the Kyuubi's seal and curling delicately around the blonde's sides in a parody of a chain belt.



"What...what did you...do?"



"I'm sorry Naruto. But you won't be around for much longer." Sasuke said quietly, before leaping upwards and back to the salamander behind him.



Orochimaru had known that at some point during the battle, Sasuke would come face to face with Naruto. It was, in a way, fated. They were known to be rivals. Naruto had gone after Sasuke three times and failed to bring his friend back, once at fourteen, once at fifteen and once at sixteen.



Now they were both seventeen, and their bridges had been burnt.



But Naruto kept trying to grow their friendship out of the ashes.



So the snake Sannin had prepared Sasuke for their inevitable confrontation. He'd designed a set of seals which would cause Naruto's body to burn itself out trying to maintain the original Kyuubi seal. If it worked, Naruto would die in a blaze of chakra.



If it failed, well...then he'd just try something else.



The five points of the seal Sasuke used would disrupt the chakra pathways around the seal, channeling the chakra used to maintain it into the places connected to the five-point seal he'd just forced onto Naruto's stomach.



The eight-point seal the Yondaime had created was never intended to be anything more than a prison for the kyuubi, but it had taken a lot of damage over the years. First from Orochimaru's five-point seal when he was twelve, then with Jiraiya's own counter-seal a short while later.



Now Sasuke's seal would do the rest of the damage and cause each weakness of the eight-point seal to overload and break down, flooding Naruto's body with the excess chakra. It was, if compared to the methods used by the Hyuuga, crude and unrefined. It lacked skill and any need for delicacy or precision.



Which was why Sasuke could do it. With a little bit of help from his sharingan.



Naruto's body arched upwards, his back bending at an impossible angle, blood spurting from his mouth and running out of his nose and ears. He would probably have screamed if his throat hadn't convulsed shut.



Sasuke stood on his salamander, watching dispassionately as Naruto died. His attention was half on Naruto, half on the vicious and brutal fight between the two Legendary Sannin and Kabuto.



The changes brought on from the battle slowly started to reverse.



Naruto's eyes were the first to change, turning back to their cornflower blue, his fangs shortened into a more reasonable length, although they would never be as human as they once were. The fur disappeared back into bronzed human skin and his limbs regained their natural form. His fingers would never be as short as they once were, with his new small claw-like nails, but overall he now resembled the ninja Sasuke once knew.



Sasuke stared as Naruto slowly regained his senses, his bright blue eyes dark with pain and regret. Sasuke knew that with Naruto's hyper-awareness of his own body, he could probably tell that he was dying, his body basically turning in on itself.



Naruto pushed himself back upwards to his knees, the razor wire slicing deeply into the bare skin of his arms and upper body from the effort. He forced himself to stagger upwards on shaky legs, spitting the blood from his mouth before flashing a red-toothed smile at Sasuke.



"I thought...you would be...the one...to kill...me." Naruto groaned, the first flickerings of the chakra overload beginning to tell on his body.



Above him, Gamabunta and Manda had separated, their summoners moving back to a safe distance. Jiraiya knew something was wrong, his skin whitening when he saw the black tattoo-esque markings around Naruto's abdomen.



"Fuck! Naruto!"



Naruto turned his head, taking a step forward before stumbling and landing heavily on his knees. "Ne, ero-sennin? You should move back. I don't think I'm gonna...last much...longer." Naruto's voice slowly got fainter.



Jiraiya jumped down off Gamabunta's head, the creature disappearing in a puff of white smoke. He managed to cover half the distance between them, passing Sasuke and his summon, before the air around them suddenly stilled, every tiny scrap of oxygen suddenly being sucked forward towards Naruto so fast it left a partial vacuum behind and around him.



Naruto's body started to glow blue...then red...then violet as the two chakra sources inside him merged and fought between themselves.



Then everything exploded.



Naruto screamed, a sudden wind whipped his hair up and out of it's ties, the bloody long blonde strands slashing at the air around Naruto's head. The razor wire around his upper body split and shredded into tiny pieces.



Sasuke watched as his once best friend died. He couldn't turn away, not now, not when he was directly responsible. It was mesmerising in it's own way. Naruto had always seemed indestructible from outside sources. He always healed, always fought, always shouted in defiance to his attackers, to his foes, to his obstacles.



Sasuke was destroying him.



So why did this victory seem so empty?



Jiraiys stared at the sorrow in Naruto's eyes, unable to force his body to move through the overwhelming pressure bearing down on him.



Naruto threw his head back, his screams almost undistinguishable from the howling of the chakra-reinforced wind surrounding him.



The air pulsed once...then twice, small embers of glowing light suddenly expelling themselves from Naruto's body.



The world turned red. The sky itself turning black.



Then the power erupted, blinding all who stood on the battlefield. The world turned white for miles, a huge shockwave enveloping the earth. The air split and threw those standing down without care, the trees closest uprooted and blasted backwards.



When everything settled, and those who could see again looked...Naruto was gone.



Only a massive crater remained.







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Tbc


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