Never Perfect

Authors note: This will be one hell of a cliff hanger. I’ve written up to a certain point and am unsure as to if I will continue. But the idea would not leave me alone. Please let me know your thoughts.

A/N 2! Now Beta’d. Cookies for Telpei! And you can thank Telpei for harassing me for the next chapter.

From Chapter 451 SPOILERS!!!!!.


Things never really go perfectly in life. That’s what led to what was ‘life’ now: Danzo as Hokage, and Sasuke on the loose. In the early days of rebuilding Konoha he had come to attack the village. Naruto, of course, was there to face him in all his glory. His sage charka had been pulsing with life, but his focus had been his failing. He was so focused on Sasuke that he didn’t see Madara until it was too late and the ancient Uchiha was already in control, pulling out Kyubbi’s charka and forcing tails to emerge one by one. He was up to a sixth tail before anybody could step in. His father couldn’t help him this time. That chance was gone. It was Sasuke, Sasuke who forced Madara out of Naruto’s head. Sasuke who kept his writhing body safe while helping Naruto to push back the Kyubbi. He waited until there was one tail left, the blond’s skin was still burning away and regenerating, but with a last look to Naruto again – that one tail writhing back and forth – he turned away and left.

“Your life will not be the cost of my revenge.”

No, not Naruto’s life, but maybe his sanity. Something was dreadfully wrong. He could not suppress that final tail. Yamoto was too weak from the rebuilding of the village to try to contain him and stabilise him. The containment room in the hospital had not yet been rebuilt. For days Naruto stayed in the spot of his defeat, constantly surrounded. He didn’t eat or sleep. He burned. He tore. He healed only to tear and burn all over again. Danzo picked his closest friends. The only ones he didn’t lash out to kill. Instead of striking to kill, the little piece of Naruto’s mind that was still Naruto himself managed to restrain the Kyuubi so that the attacks were not mortally wounding. He used Naruto’s friends to herd the tormented Jinchuuriki, directing them to his own ‘private’ Kyubbi containment chamber, which was deep underground in the mountain. Danzo had been preparing since the Kyubbi had been sealed in the baby boy. Every time Naruto slipped, he had petitioned for Naruto to be locked up down there. Now, finally, he had him.

Once he was locked up tight, Danzo issued his orders, horrifying Naruto’s friends. No food, no water; he explained that the Kyubbi charka would keep ‘it’ alive. Inside the room no relief could be given. Even slamming itself against the walls merely increased it’s pain. The walls and roof were riddled with symbols that sucked at the Kyubbi’s charka, drawing it closer to the skin. The aim of the room was not to suppress the Kyubbi, but to forcefully draw it out and contain it. Nobody knew until it was too late. Danzo had always wanted his own private demon in the basement. Now he had one. The whole process was designed to destroy Naruto. From the sounds that floated up the long stairway it was obvious the man was dead. He would never survive past 7 or 8 tails.

The council nodded their heads to the logic. The threat of having a demon in the basement was that if Leaf village was ever on the verge of being destroyed, they just release the demon and take their enemies to hell with them. The council had always wanted a way to control the Kyubbi, and Danzo had given them the solution they longed for.

Nobody entered the room, as that would be a death sentence. There was no way to see into the cavernous area, as that could just be another escape route for the demon to find. Danzo held all the pieces in this game. Once enough time had passed for people to be concerned, everyone was informed of what was really down there: that Naruto was dead. They were told exactly what it would mean to open the door: Kyubbi’s release Followed by a swift death at the enraged demon’s hands.

Naruto was deeply mourned, but people were so busy blaming themselves that real blame wasn’t laid where it should have been. In a calculated move Danzo held a ceremony where Naruto’s name was added to the Honour Stone, engraved As Namikaze-Uzimaki Naruto. The subterfuge of this move slipped past in the surprise of Naruto’s parentage. Danzo recognized Team Seven’s past and feelings of guilt and used it against them, keeping them as a team. Sai, Sakura and Kakashi. Gave them ‘Naruto’s Final Mission’. Capture an Uchiha. Destroy the other. Truly Danzo didn’t care, he just wanted one of them to control the Kyubbi, in order to make it into a weapon instead of a suicide device, but if Team Seven thought they were being allowed to bring back Sasuke ...well, they would be more docile.

Months moved past and Team seven followed clues, trails and dead ends. It was one such mission they were on now. Sasuke had been seen alone in this town. The team had settled into the local inn and ate quietly in a booth of the tap room. Nothing unexpected had occurred thus far throughout their travels, nothing different from one day to the next. Until today. Today was a day for change. Their dead stares at their food or the table were rudely interrupted by a fourth body sliding into the booth.

“Where’s Naruto?”

Sasuke had slipped in through the door and calmly joined them at the table. No one even thought to go for weapons, as the question sank through. It hurt and gouged at tender hearts, especially coming from Uchiha Sasuke. His hair had been trimmed short again, closer to how he had worn it in his genin days, but apart from that he looked unchanged. He seemed undamaged by the heartache that aged those sitting around him. Life was perfect, it was unfair.

“Where is the Dobe? I’ve been watching you for a week and there’s no sign of him.”

Sakura sucked in a breath tears sparkling in her eyes.

“He’s…he died Sasuke.”

“This had better be some kind of joke or a trap to catch me. I’m warning you, explain. Now!.”

His voice was sharp, hard, like a kunai blade stabbing straight into hearts. His face betrayed nothing but his hands on the table were balled into fists and dear god his eyes, they burned with the menace of Sharingan.

“When..when you left him, he couldn’t get the last tail down, and he was still burning. Yamoto was exhausted.”

Sasuke’s left hand twitched and Kakashi took notice.

“So what, you decided to kill him? You didn’t think to find me? I wasn’t far. Was he not just contained?”

Kakashi was the one that tensed this time.

“We didn’t kill him. The containment room we had for him hadn’t been rebuilt yet. Danzo had one of his own. We didn’t know what it would actually do to him until it was too late.”

He explained to Sasuke exactly as it had been explained to him and everything it meant. He expected Sasuke to lash out, but he didn’t – he merely gazed at each of them in turn. His hands relaxed and the Sharingan died down.

“So you’re here to find Danzo a Kyubbi tamer. Well you got one. Take me in.”

“Sasuke..wait, what?”

Sakura was staring opened mouthed. Disbelief and hope were warring in her mint green eyes.

“Don’t mistake my reasoning. Before, when I controlled the Kyubbi, it was with Naruto’s help. I want to test my strength against the real thing now that he’s out of the way.”

“Dickless was right about you. You’re a cold-hearted bastard Sasuke-kun.”

Sai had a smile on his face but it was cold and dead.

“What would you know about hearts Sai?”

Sasuke’s cruel question went without an answer.


Growls, barks and, most frighteningly, the occasional bought of dark laughter drifted up from the dark bowels of the chamber through rock walls. Two months had gone by before they even let Sasuke anywhere near it. The head of the Yamanaka clan was there to jump into Sasuke’s head if he tried to turn the demon on Leaf Village. He would enter the chamber and it would be sealed behind him. The door could not be opened from the inside. He had an hour, nothing more nothing less. If he failed to survive or if the signal was ill-timed the door would not be opened at all. Do or die, so to speak.

When the door opened he stepped through and listened to the slam behind him without a qualm. The room was lit by the eerie, flickering red glow coming from the same place as the now steady growl. Sasuke was not feeling rushed as the thing didn’t move an inch. His pitiful lantern emitted a glow that illuminated the area; what Sasuke saw was not what he had been told to expect, but foolish dreams of a pissed Naruto were not realised either.

Before him was not a massive nine tailed red fox demon. Neither was it the sunshine that Naruto radiated. It was hard to make out exactly what it was. It was a ball of demon charka curled perfectly in the centre of the room. Resolutely Sasuke began to try and count what he was sure were tails curled tightly around the mass. Even as he tried to follow the overlapping mass, blood trickled out and up, defying gravity, before burning away in the charka mass. This was no nine tailed beast. It was still bleeding, and seemed almost pathetically small in the massive chamber. Being curled as it was in the perfect centre suggested it was avoiding the demon-charka-drawing walls. All that added up to one thing.

“God Naruto, what have they done to you?”

He gave up trying to count tails, the overlapping made it impossible. Still the Kyubbi/Naruto thing didn’t move, but as he spoke he had sensed its attention shift to him. He couldn’t do anything if it didn’t show him its eyes. But it, Naruto, was protecting himself.

“Sas…..Sa……”

That grating voice was horrible; not Naruto’s but the attempt at his name nearly broke Sasuke’s cold Uchiha heart. This was what he had hoped for. Enough Naruto left to save. His voice came out rough but imploring.

“Naruto, you’ve got to trust me now. You need to uncurl. I need to see your eyes.”

Sasuke’s jolted for a second before he got himself under control as a bestial roar came from the centre of the blood and fire before the tails unwound and flicked out to smash at him. Using his speed Sasuke dodged and jumped, clearing them, when just as quickly they were drawn back in and wrapped around again. Sasuke had taken care to count as they came at him. The ball wound tighter.

Three. Dear god, all this time down here and Naruto only had three tails. A whine came from the ball as the silence stretched on.

“I’m okay Naruto, they didn’t hit me.”

The ball quivered as if muscles were wretchedly fighting against each other, more blood began to leak out becoming an almost steady flow. One paw – arm - slid out of the mass, the claws making a shrieking noise across the stone floor.

“That’s it Naruto. Look at me.”

His voice stayed soft, gentle. Sharingan was already swirling, changing, ready for the necessary moment. Finally, after second of strain two huge ears and a head appeared a solid black, facing away from him.

“I’m here Naruto. Turn around.”

Sasuke stayed perfectly still. With agonising slowness, the black face turned and Sasuke sucked in a breath. Only one eye glowed in the black face. The other was a hollow gouge. What else had happened to the man down here? Refusing to hesitate any longer and let Naruto feel more unnecessary pain, Sasuke plunged into his mind.