Just another day in paradise

Author’s Note: The characters of Naruto belong to Masashi Kishimoto.

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Chapter 11 - Down With the Sickness





Naruto sat on the small bed, watching Nami pretend to do her job. The nurse had been alternating between yelling at the man standing in the doorway and stacking papers in the office. The man said something and the bottle blonde threw a paperweight at him. He slammed the door shut in time to deflect the incoming mass and opened it right after, sticking his head in and saying something that sounded apologetic.


Nami stalked up to him and jerked the door out of his grasp, yelling random words between her curses. The night guard took the berating for a few minutes then smashed his lips against hers, effectively shutting the screaming woman up.


Without breaking the kiss, he wrapped his arms around her and picked her up. She jumped and wrapped her arms and legs around her lover. The guard slowly backed away with the blonde burden, shutting the door behind them.


Naruto looked at the retreating nurse before glancing at Sasuke. The Uchiha shrugged before standing up from his bunk and walked over to sit next to the blonde. Awkward silence hung between the two teens as Naruto stayed lying on the bed with the raven haired teen shifting next to him, making the springs creak. The blonde could see the band-aid that covered the cut on Sasuke’s hand and could feel the cut on the side of his wrist that had a similar bandage on it.


He had said that he would talk to Sasuke, but Shizune had burst in right after they’d made the deal. She had fussed over them both, and the cuts, and the glass. It was a wonder that the woman did not give herself an ulcer.


Still, this was the first time that they had been alone since then, and there were some things that he knew that Sasuke was going to ask that he could not answer. The raven-haired teen had seen the bruise Orochimaru had given him. And his stomach hurting was not the reason it was hard to walk.


That was the other thing that had delayed this little talk. Right after she had come back in from escorting the two rapists to their car, Shizune had cleaned his wrist then checked his stomach. It had swelled. She called it aggravated, and considering that the snake had kneeled on it, that was no big surprise. Shizune gave him a double dose of antibiotics and painkillers that had knocked him out for the rest of her shift.


He had woken up to Sazusa trying to get him to eat. He had refused. His stomach was throbbing and he had not felt like tempting fate. Sazusa had given up after a while and he had been content to just lay here. The throbbing from his stomach did not let him move around much and his hips enjoyed the lack of movement.


But all good things must come to an end. Nami had shown up and started her little drama, leaving him with Sasuke, who’d had all day to think up questions to ask. Naruto sighed and looked up at the pale face that was watching him, waiting for him to speak.

"We had a deal."


"Yeah."


Naruto coughed to clear his throat, it was scratchy from disuse. Sasuke reached up to Naruto’s shoulder in what the blonde thought would be a comforting gesture, but instead he pulled the collar of the shirt down so that a hand shaped bruise could be seen.


"How did you get that?"


Stupid, blunt, straight-to-the-point Sasuke just had to jump right into things Naruto did not want to talk about. Knocking the pale hand away and pulling his shirt back into place, he shook his head.


"You said that you would talk to me if there was no one else around, dobe. I’m not going to say that you talked."


Naruto rolled away and put his back to Sasuke, wincing because it pulled on his stomach. The dark haired teen cursed as he grabbed the blonde’s shoulders and pushed him onto his back so that they were face to face with Sasuke leaning over him.


"You said that you would talk, so talk."


"I can’t."


"You just did."


"Not about that."


"Why the fuck not?"


Sasuke had started to yell. The grip on Naruto’s shoulders had intensified, and as the raven-haired teen spoke the last time, he shook the blonde.


Naruto looked up into the black eyes and whimpered, his bottom lip quivering as he tried not to panic.


The pale face hovering above his looked down at him. The grip on his arms were immediately released as Sasuke got off the bed and sank to sit on the floor.

Naruto had to take several calming breaths before he could look at the pale face of the Uchiha who had twisted around so he could look at him.


"Naruto, what happened?"


"Please don’t, don’t ask me that."


"Ok, so what happened to your face?"


Sasuke’s voice dropped a few octaves.


"Did you do it to yourself like they think?"


Naruto swallowed hard and looked away. He could not answer that. If he said anything that gave away that he’d been raped again, then Sasuke would have to say something to the nurses. Then Orochimaru would find out that he had talked again. Then both of them would end up as some sadists’ plaything.


A cool hand brushed against his arm, drawing the blonde’s attention back to Sasuke.


"Yes or no, did you do it?"

"No."


The blonde teen squirmed and kicked the blanket off of him. Maybe it was Sasuke fishing for answers, but the room felt hot. Sweat was starting to bead on his forehead and his palms were sticky.


"No, I did not cut myself."


"Then who did?"


"I can’t say."


"Why?"


"That’s why my face was cut."


Naruto watched as Sasuke turned all the way around so that his legs were under the bed.


"What?"


"My face was cut to keep me quiet. I talked, so they cut it again."


"Who?"


The blonde saw the darkness that clouded the Uchiha’s eyes. Similar to the way it had clouded the older Uchiha’s when he did something he did not like. The pale knuckles had turned white from the fist Sasuke was making, and Naruto could feel the anger just under the surface of the raven-haired teen’s emotional bottle.


Not wanting to see the other teen’s reaction, Naruto looked away.


"If I say, they’ll cut me again, and worse."


"DAMN IT, NARUTO. Why are you protecting them? If you say who hurt you, then they can be locked up. Are you afraid of them coming back and hurting you again? They can’t get you here. You’re safe here. No one is going to hurt you."


"You’re wrong. They already hurt me again. And I’m not protecting them."


Naruto did not say that he was protecting the bastard that was yelling at him. Not only from the basement, but also from the knowledge of who ran it. Sasuke had tried to kill himself after having watched his family die in front of him. It would not take much to send the raven haired teen back to that state of mind. How would Sasuke take the knowledge that the school uniform that he’d been wearing when he was tied under the sink was his? Provided by the elder Uchiha. Or that some of the worst things that had happened to him, were because the pale man related to Sasuke had wanted it to happen? That people he had known his entire life, had attended dinner parties with, had enjoyed tying the blonde up and making him scream?


Ignorance is bliss. In this case, Naruto agreed with that. The less Sasuke knew about what had happened, the better.


Naruto wiggled around on the bed and panted. Shit, it was getting hot in here. He wanted to take off his shirt, but then Sasuke would see that he had a hand shaped bruise on his hip as well. He sat up, thinking that he was overheating from staying in one place for too long. He groaned as his stomach muscles protested, but sat up anyway.


"You’re not going to tell me, are you?"


Sliding to the cold floor next to Sasuke and liking the way the tiles chilled him, he shrugged.


Sasuke grunted and turned around so that his back was against the bed again.


There were a few moments of comfortable silence before Sasuke spoke.


"Was it your first time?"


"What!!! Why would you want to know that?"


This time Sasuke shrugged.


"So was it?"


Naruto looked away, red faced.


"Yes. So what about you? Are you a virgin?"


"Depends on what base you count as losing it."


"You’re avoiding the question."


The raven-haired teen grunted and looked away.


"You are. Sasuke is a virgin."


The blonde wanted to dance around and rub it in, that the almighty bastard had not popped his cherry. But seeing as his stomach and hips took a vote and decided that staying still was the better option, he stayed sitting, laughing and sing-songing at Sasuke all the same.


"Shut up, Naruto. At least I got to second with a girl."


"Low blow, bastard. Shit, I just thought that you would be a porn star by now with all the girls throwing themselves at your feet. "


"Yeah right. All they want are bragging rights. ‘Oh my god. I just slept with an Uchiha and he was like, wow.’"


The blonde teen forgot to be pissed at Sasuke’s near perfect imitation of Ino and burst out laughing, stopping as his stomach sent a stab of pain to notify him that belly laughing upset it. He felt hot again, so he scooted over to a new location that had not been heated by his body yet. Feeling the cold tiles pressing against his legs, he panted and wiped some sweat from his forehead.


"Did it hurt? I mean, you were bleeding pretty badly and you don’t want to talk about it."


The blonde focused his tired eyes on to the form next to him, then looked away.


"Most of the time they were only out to make me scream in pain. But some of it didn’t hurt that much. That’s the worst part I guess, because if you’re hurting, then you can say that you hated it. But some of it, ..I… I got hard from. I didn’t want to, but I still did. I didn’t like it, but I still responded to the parts that felt good. I felt dirtier afterwards than if I had been screaming in pain, disgusted that I got wood from the touches."


Slowly, in the silence that followed his statement, he sprawled out on to the cold floor. His head felt heavy and the air around him felt heated.


"Hey bastard, why did you try and kill yourself? I know you weren’t that close to your parents."


Sasuke huffed and shifted before answering.


"Because I always wanted to go with them. They always left me to go to some place warm and exotic. The night that Itachi killed them, my dad had promised to take me with him. Then he was killed, right in front of me. His blood was dripping off my bangs. He had left me again. They all left me. And I just, I just wanted to be with them. Just once. I wanted to go with them"


Naruto heard the way the raven-haired teen’s voice choked up and he spun himself on the tiles so that he could grab Sasuke’s pant leg and gently tug on it.


"I want you here."


Sasuke looked down at the blonde that lay on the cold floor next to him. The tan hand clutching his pant leg was a reminder that he was not alone. Naruto was breathing in pants and a bead of sweat dripped off his forehead. When the blonde had spun on the floor, his shirt had ridden up and Sasuke could see the large red area that covered his stomach.


Puffy red skin interrupted with course stitches and dark veins. Half of it was still covered by the shirt, but Sasuke could see that the wound was pulling on the stitches and it looked like an overstuffed seam about to burst.


"Naruto, did Nami give you the shot of antibiotics?"


Eyelids drooped as Naruto took a ragged breath. Slowly, the blonde’s head turned from side to side.


Sasuke got to his knees, the tan hand falling from his pant leg to the floor as he scooted to Naruto’s side and pulled the shirt up.


The blonde gave an undignified squeal and swatted at the hands as he tried to get away from the raven-haired teen leaning over him.


"Damn it, Naruto. Stop it."


The blonde backpedaled away from Sasuke and started to thrash when the raven-haired teen grabbed him to stop him from getting away. The obsidian-eyed teen pinned the weakly struggling teen’s hands next to his head and sat on the blonde’s hips to stop the blue eyed teen. Naruto struggled briefly, then whimpered and went completely limp under the Uchiha.


Slowly, Sasuke released Naruto’s wrists and pulled the blonde’s shirt up to his armpits. Seeing the bottom of the bruise on his shoulder, the raven-haired teen pulled the shirt all the way off the limp blonde.


Sasuke watched the sweat bead and slither off the tan chest as he sat straddling Naruto. The bruise he had seen earlier on the blonde’s neck was only a finger of the hand shaped blue mark. And as he placed his hand on the mark, seeing it was larger than his hand, Naruto yelped.


"It’s okay, Naruto. I just want to see. I won’t hurt you."


Blue eyes met Black, and Naruto looked away quickly, annoying Sasuke with his lack of trust. As his pale hands drifted lower on the blonde teen’s abdomen, a ripple passed through the sweating tan flesh, and Naruto shuddered.


Nami had left the lights on. And in the artificial lighting, Sasuke could see the pus oozing out of the cut on Naruto’s side. The mucus-like substance was leaking out between the black strands that held the sides together. The flesh around it was red and had swelled; The light showed the dark veins that were spidering out from the wound to fade out farther down the tan flesh.


It was infected. And the blonde’s body felt scorching to Sasuke’s pale hands.


"I’ll be right back."


Standing up, he sprinted to the curtained area and rummaged through the cabinets until he found the thermometer. Returning to Naruto’s side, he placed the thing in the blonde’s ear and pressed the button to get the read out.


102.34


"Shit."


Removing it from the blonde’s ear, Sasuke shook it then put it back in and pressed the button again.


102.40


He was no doctor; He didn’t know what to do to bring down a fever. The blonde was ill because of the infection in his stomach. And anything he did to bring the fever down would just be a temporary fix until Naruto could have the surgery he needed. Still, as the blue-eyed teen lay gasping on the cold floor, twisting around so that he could get off the tiles already warmed by his body heat and on to fresh cold ones, the drive to do something to help him was almost overwhelming.


Whenever he had a fever, Martha had always given him something that tasted horrible and made him sleep. He’d always wake up and feel fine. But then he’d never had anything serious. Just a bout or two of the flu. Setting the thermometer next to the panting teen, Sasuke gently shook the blonde’s shoulder to get Naruto to open his eyes.


"Naruto, how do you bring a fever down?"


"How bad is it?"


"You’re at 102 and climbing."


"Motrin and cold clothes."


Sasuke watched as the tired blue eyes closed again. He jumped up and grabbed some of the hand towels kept with the regular towels for the showers. Going to the bathroom and placing them in the sink, he turned the faucet on to the coldest setting. Hearing the pipes groan and seeing nothing come out of them, he cursed before picking the towels up, and stalked to the shower.


The larger pipes were less likely to freeze and sure enough water came spurting out of the showerhead. Drenching his arm and the towels in the cold water then ringing them out, he returned to the blonde’s side.


Sasuke place a towel on Naruto’s forehead, making the blonde open his eyes then close them again right away. The other towels were placed on his overheating body and Sasuke was unsure if he should put one on the infected wound. He thought heat drew infection out, but he needed to lower the blonde’s body temperature.


"It’s okay, Sasuke. Just stay here. I’ll be fine."


Naruto’s raspy voice made him look at the half lidded eyes and see that the corners of the blonde’s mouth were lifted into a small smile.


"What about the Motrin?"


"It’ll be locked up in the office. I couldn’t swallow it anyways. Just stay here."


Naruto had grabbed his pant leg again and Sasuke acquiesced, getting himself into a comfortable sitting with his back leaning on Naruto’s bunk right next to the blonde’s head.


Nami had not taken the remote from them before leaving, so Sasuke hit the button and caught the tail end of the news.


The night ticked on with Sasuke getting up and changing the towels that covered Naruto after every infomercial. Several hours into the night, he had gone to soak the towels again when a hoarse voice cried out, "No."


The raven-haired teen darted out of the bathroom just as Naruto curled into a ball and screamed. He rushed to the blonde’s side as Naruto twisted about on the floor, fighting people who were not there. One flailing hand caught Sasuke in the chest as he sat next to Naruto. More startling that hurting him, he grabbed the wrist to keep the blonde from hitting him again.


"Calm down, Naruto. You’re making it worse."


The sick blonde teen tried to pull his hand away from the worried teen that held it, crying out when Sasuke would not let go.


"Stop. No more. Please stop."


Naruto began to thrash, kicking out from his curled position and clipping Sasuke with a few awkward punches. The raven-haired teen watched as the blonde twisted and lunged, so desperate to get away from his memories. The stitched cut over his stomach started to bleed and had yellow oozing out with the crimson.


‘Not good.’


Gritting his teeth, Sasuke lied down on the cold floor next to Naruto and gathered the thrashing teen into his arms, holding him firmly. Preventing him from making the wound any worse. Naruto gave a few strangled cries and tried to push Sasuke away, but the raven-haired teen held on to the sweat soaked flesh of Naruto’s back, pressing the tan face against his collarbone and murmuring nonsense things that seemed to calm the fevered teen.


Later, as rhythmic breathing suggested that the blonde was asleep, he set the blonde back on the floor and retrieved the abandoned towels from the bathroom. Placing the damp towels on the blonde, he found the thermometer two bunks over from Naruto from where he knocked it away when started to thrash.


Talking to him, knowing that he would not respond but not wanting to surprise him, Sasuke took Naruto’s temperature again.


104.12


Twisting around, he looked at the clock. 2:30AM. Shizune would not come in until 7 and there was no sign of Nami.


Panic had been slowly creeping into the iron front of the pale Uchiha. The body stops working at 106, and Naruto was slowly getting closer to it.


Naruto needed help. Not just cold clothes placed over him. Sasuke could feel a lump of cold dread settle in his stomach as an hour ticked by and Naruto’s fever rose. The blonde would squirm and hiss in pain and the raven-haired teen could tell that without help, Naruto would not make it through the night.


He was sitting next to his friend, watching him die.


Tears jumped to his dark eyes as the conclusion he had been avoiding became too obvious to ignore. Panic coursed through the normally stoic young man and he jumped up from the blonde’s side and ran to the locked door, pounding on it and screaming for all he was worth. Nami was a whore, a bitch, a thousand other things, but she could help Naruto.


Beating the solid door until his fists hurt, he heard the blonde whine in his fevered state, no longer able to cry out. Slowly, he slumped down to his knees and put his forehead on the cold metal of the door. He had to help Naruto, but how? The orphanage was so old that the telephone was mounted outside the door because there was no in wall wiring, so he could not call anyone for help. Nami was indisposed at the moment and too preoccupied to hear his calls for help.


God. He wished Martha was here, or Shizune. Both of them would be able to help Naruto. Martha had given him her home phone number. Fat lot of good it was doing tucked away in his cell phone locked in the safe.


Looking over at the iron block that sat under the desk, he cursed the damn nurse. A small red light caught his attention from the top of the desk in the general area of Nami’s purse. The pink bag had been knocked to its side in the nurse’s temper tantrum, and the red light was blinking from its depths.


Slowly, Sasuke got up and went to the pink bag, removing the cell phone that had a cat on its cover that blinked red eyes. A small smile graced the Uchiha’s face as he flipped the cell phone open, only to find that there was no signal.


Naruto groaned and twisted on the floor. Sasuke looked up from the phone and out at the blonde through the large glass window. Looking over, he saw the numbers of all the nurses taped to the glass. Shizune was the topmost one, and he punched the number in.


Walking out of the office and waving the phone around like it was some sort of divining rod, Sasuke searched for a signal. Thinking that it would be stronger if the room had any windows, he darted to the bathroom. The squares of opaque glass shined with frost and the raven-haired teen reached the phone up towards the shimmering light.


A single bar flashed on to the screen then disappeared. Cursing, he climbed onto the urinal so that he was closer to the window and tried again. Getting the bar to stay, he hit send and the phone began to ring.


It took ten rings before Shizune picked up with a groggy, "hello?"


"Shizune!!! It’s Naruto. He’s sick. I can’t find Nami. Hello? Hello?"


Ripping the phone from his ear, Sasuke looked at the blank screen. Apparently, the blinking cats eyes meant the battery was low. Cursing, his foot slipped and he fell from his precarious perch, soaking his foot in the inch of water that resided at the bottom of the urinal.


A steady stream of curses flowed from his mouth as he returned to Naruto’s side. Hopefully Shizune would come. Hopefully, he would not get cholera from whatever was in the urinal. The blonde teen had stopped moving and had been just lying on the floor for a while now, but as Sasuke sat next to him, the blue eyes opened and a hoarse voice whispered.


"Sasuke, stay."


The raven-haired teen felt a burning hot hand grip his pant leg at his thigh and watched as the blue eyes closed and Naruto resumed his panting. Removing the towel from his forehead, Sasuke ran his fingers through the damp, blonde bangs.


"I’ll stay right here."


Naruto made a small sound like a whimper, so Sasuke returned the towel to his forehead.


Half an hour later, the door burst open and Shizune came storming in. Snow clung to her dark hair and she was panting like she had just sprinted from her car. Her dark eyes looked over the room when she spotted the Uchiha sitting next to an unmoving form on the floor. She sprinted over, kneeling next to Naruto.


Sasuke could not hide the look of relief that spread across his face at the appearance of the nurse. She would help Naruto; He would not be alone in watching over the blonde. She pulled her mittens off and placed one hand next to the infected and oozing wound. The other hand grabbed the thermometer and placed it in Naruto’s ear.


105.03


What happened next was a blur as Shizune and Sasuke carried Naruto to the metal table and Shizune started to work, removing the blonde’s sweat pants and starting an IV. Sasuke stood to the side and watched her place ice packs from the now unlocked freezer around Naruto, and administer something via the IV to bring his temperature down. Then, she was on the phone in the hall, then back at the blonde’s side. A whirling ball of efficiency that pressed a cup of hot cocoa into his hands and told him to sit down on the nearest bunk as she checked the blonde’s temperature again.


He could not sit. He could not leave him. What if something happened?


So he stood next to Naruto and sipped the hot chocolate with shaking hands. Something almost had happened. Naruto had been so close to not waking up that it still scared him.


Looking over the blonde on the table who was wearing only the white boxers the orphanage provided, Sasuke spotted another hand shaped bruise on the tanned hip. Setting the cup of cocoa down, he walked over and placed his hand on top of the bruise, having to switch sides so that he could get his hand into the proper position.


The bruise rested at the top of Naruto’s pelvis, heel of the hand down and fingers splayed up, the thumb mark was on the front and the pinky was on his back. It was an odd way for a handprint to be placed. The person either had to have been lower than Naruto and reaching up, or between the blonde’s legs pulling the teen towards him.


Sasuke’s eyes grew wide and he looked at the other bruise he had questioned Naruto about earlier. The bluish mark that marred his shoulder was in the same basic position as this one.


Left shoulder, right hip, holding the shoulders down and forcing the hips up. Naruto had been raped, again. Not only did the fucks cut his face, they raped him again.


Looking up to the face that still had the bandages covering it, Sasuke sighed. He had promised not to say that they talked to each other, but this had to be brought out into the open. He had been raped here. No wonder he did not feel safe.


Softly, he called Shizune over and showed her the bruises on his friend, then showed her that they were at least a size bigger then his hands and asked where he got them.


A dark look crossed her face and she went and made more phone calls. When the doctor she called came, he had a nurse armed with a rape kit with him and the imposing form of Ibiki in his wake.


Once again, he stood at Naruto’s head, placing a hand on the blonde’s shoulder and picking a spot on the wall to stare at. He did not want to see what the doctor was doing down there to his friend. Each of the nurses held one of Naruto’s legs into the correct position for the doctor to work as Ibiki stood in the hall.


This time, Naruto was mostly out of it and did not fight the doctor, making it go a lot quicker. Even after it was done, he stayed standing next to Naruto’s head, tucking a few wild strands of blonde hair behind his ear and murmuring that it was going to be alright.


The tan flesh was no longer heated and the wound on his side had been opened and drained. Naruto was still hooked up to the IV and had a towel over his waist to provide some modesty. The doctor, a young man with large glasses and buckteeth, gave his report to Ibiki.


"He was raped within the last 24 hours. The tissue is bruised and torn but there was no other evidence found. As for his stomach, it can still be treated with antibiotics so he’ll have to wait a little longer to have the surgery."


Shizune started to argue with the man, saying that Naruto needed it now, but the doctor shook his head and repeated himself. Then there was Ibiki, who had stayed quietly out of the way until now. He started to ask question after question about who was with Naruto the last day, and when she said Orochimaru, she just as quickly dismissed the idea.


Kabuto had said that the pallid man had to take a call and was in the hallway for the majority of the time. That he had come and discovered Naruto in the bathroom with his face cut after he had finished his business. It would have been suspicious if it was just Orochimaru’s testimony, but with Doctor Kabuto backing his alibi, there was no questioning it.

Sasuke listened to the grilling the scarred man gave Shizune and looked up when Nami walked in at 6:30, a half an hour before Shizune was supposed to show up. The dark haired nurse looked over at the bottle blonde, and Sasuke could see the anger flowing through Shizune.


"You’re fired."


It was calm, collected, and did not sound like she meant it.


"What?"


"I said you’re fired. I never want to see you again; Your negligence almost killed Naruto. Leave now."


Ibiki cleared his throat and told her to hold on. He grabbed his trench coat and walked with her, grilling her about the same things he had just asked Shizune.


Naruto woke up to the harsh overhead lights and groaned, turning his head and seeing Sasuke standing next to the table he was on. Concern flooded the pale features and the blonde could see the pale hand shaking around a half empty cup.


He had been aware, in some part of his mind, of what was going on around him and had heard the doctor say that he would have to wait to have the surgery. He looked up at the pale face with the worry lines and dark circles around the eyes from lack of sleep. Sasuke had stayed next to him throughout it all. Through the fever and the thrashing, the rape kit and the treatment, Sasuke never left him.


Slowly, he reached out with the hand that was not hindered with an IV, and grabbed the raven-haired teen’s shirt, making the teen look away from the nurse that was still talking to the doctor.


Sasuke let out a ragged breath and called Shizune over. Then they helped him into a new set of clothes and into his bed, setting the IV stand next to him so he would be more comfortable as he received his medications. After Shizune walked away to try to convince the doctor to perform the surgery, Sasuke sat on the bed opposite the IV stand, and leaned over him and set his forehead on his shoulder in an odd imitation of a hug.


"Don’t you fucking dare die on me, dobe. Don’t you leave me behind too. Just wait and they’ll get you that damn surgery you need."


Naruto smiled and gently tugged on the raven-haired teen so that Sasuke was lying next to him on the bed. Sasuke shifted uncomfortably from the closeness and Naruto scooted back, giving him more room on the bed.


The dark eyed teen was taking Naruto’s brush with death harder than he was. But then, Naruto already knew that he was going to die. Orochimaru no longer needed him; the man that was interested in "fostering" him was the elder Uchiha. He had been taken for just the weekend so the Uchiha could try him out and see if he was worth the money Orochimaru would charge to have an orphan vanish from the city records.


Now with everything that had happened, there was no way he could be "fostered out." He knew the scam Orochimaru was pulling and was a liability to the snake. That was why the snake-like man was so paranoid about him talking.


The pallid man could not just kill him and be done with it. But he could deny him the medical treatment he needed. Orochimaru was the final person that would have to approve the money for the surgery, and all he had to do was get a doctor that said that it could still be treated with antibiotics and the orphanage’s policy would do the rest. They would keep waiting for the wound to get bad enough, when it already was. He would die slowly from the infection or starvation, because he could not eat like this.


Tears jumped to his eyes and the blonde looked out at Shizune, still arguing with the doctor. She was the one that was going to take the fall for him dying. And if Sasuke was this shaken up about him getting sick, how would he take waking up and finding him dead?


The lump in his throat that he had managed to keep at bay every time he thought about his fate came back with renewed force. He was going to die here and it scared the shit out of him. He would never see Sakura again or eat ramen; all that was left for him were these dreary cracked walls.


Tears dripped silently down his face and were brushed away by a pale hand.


"It’ll be okay, Naruto. Shizune will get you that surgery soon."


Looking over at the pale face that was hovering close to his, the blonde could see the hope that was in the dark eyes. It was wrong to let him think that he would get out of here. Glancing towards the door and seeing Shizune still fighting with the doctor over the severity of his condition, he decided to tell him.


"Sasuke, I’m not going to get the surgery. The guy that did this to me is the one that has to approve it. And he never will."


Naruto felt Sasuke go rigged and the hand that had brushed his tears away gripped his shoulder.


"Orochimaru."


Panic flashed in Naruto’s head as Sasuke said the name, but the raven-haired teen gave a sly smile and told him to calm down.


"How did you know it was him?"


"His story about what happened to your face did not add up. Kabuto never left the room during our session, so there was no way he could have seen Orochimaru walking the halls and talking on his cell phone. And the other thing is, that the cell phone would not work in here. The walls are too thick. I had to stand on the urinal to get a single bar of signal, and the hallway would not have had any. Besides he’s a gangly guy with large hands."


Naruto looked at Sasuke in shock and had to clear his throat before speaking.


"Did you tell?"


"No. I just figured it out when you said that he was the one that had to finalize the approval for the surgery."


"Are you going to tell?"


"Do you want me to?"


"He’ll just come up with something to slander us and prove his innocence."


"That’s what I figured too."


Naruto sighed and looked away. They were back at square one. Orochimaru was one hell of a neat freak. There was no doubt that he had already somehow made his cell phone record match his story and had gotten the person he was supposed to have been talking to versed on the conversation that they’d never had.


Sasuke’s arm that was still draped across his chest gently shook him and he looked back at the raven-haired teen that was still lying next to him.


"Can you wait a week?"


"Why?"


"The school is coming here to do some community service, and we can get out of here in the confusion. I’ll take you to a private hospital and pay for the surgery."


"How do you know this?"


"I was on the student council, remember? We talked about it right before I went and found a rat chewing on you."


Naruto opened and closed his mouth a few times, trying to voice a protest but never made it. A private hospital was not under Orochimaru’s jurisdiction, and Sasuke said he would pay for it. That went against his independent ways, but the thought of dying here was enough to make him rethink that. Plus, it was not going to put too much of a strain on Sasuke’s accounts. Not with 12 insurance policies freshly cashed.


"Okay."


The blonde looked over at the Uchiha and raised his eyebrows in surprise. Sasuke had fallen asleep. For the first time since he had been here, he had fallen asleep, one arm still draped over the blonde’s chest protectively and his pale forehead resting against Naruto’s shoulder. There was still a gap between their bodies and Naruto wiggled and attempted to get the blanket over the both of them, but only managed to send it to the floor.


Shizune picked it up and spread it over the both of them, patting Naruto on the head and winking before retreating to the office.