Disclaimer: Don't own Naruto...lalalalalalala

Unlike the previous version, I haven't made any changes to the timeline. Everything is canon up to the start of this story.

Shattered Masks and Broken Hearts

A Naruto Fan Fiction

Chapter 1: The Loss of Trust

Pain.

She knew how it felt in most of its manifested forms: physical, mental, and emotional. It was synonymous with the life a shinobi, where the possibility of death and severe trauma lurked around every corner. It was something she was fully aware of ever since her academy days, and her experience of the Chuunin exams cemented that knowledge within her, and became the foundation of her future vigilance.

But this was different, and she realised this as she ran through the desolate streets of nighttime Konoha. The path behind her told a tale of hurt, sadness and undeniable guilt, demonstrated by the tears that left the lower edges of her clenched jaw line and splashed down onto the gravel speeding past her feet. The trail had started four hundred metres back at its source, and had snaked its way through multiple alleyways and over an occasional rooftop, indicating the desperation in her attempt to get away.

And the source of these sowed seeds of woe: the apartment of Konoha's number one unpredictable, knuckle-headed shinobi, Uzumaki Naruto.

The very tips of her bangs of faded pink made attempts to stick to the wetness of her cheeks, even as she jumped with all her force up and across the dimly lit rooftops. Every other step pulled a pained and laboured grunt from her throat, and every gasp for breath was met with yet another clear drop of fluid from her lower eyelids. She could taste the mildly salty essence on the edges of her lips, which were pulled back to display her grit teeth.

'How did it come to this?' she questioned herself in her rushing mind, even when she knew she could not find an answer.

She had known that something was up. Soon after their return from the Land of Iron and their confrontation with Sasuke, Naruto's mood had shifted. It was only slight at first, but to those closest to him, Sakura included, it stuck out like a sore thumb. His cheek to cheek grin was still there, but his eyes began to project sadness and lack of energy; and as much as he tried to maintain his mask of joyfulness and ignorance, his friends and sensei's could break right through it. Even the Hokage had noticed this, and had gone so far as to summon him to her office one night a few days back. When Sakura had gone to visit her shishou regarding the conversation, Tsunade barely said a word; she just kept a stoic gaze that focussed out of her window and over the village she vowed to protect. If nothing were wrong, then she would have at least opened her mouth to say so. However, her words, or lack thereof, were enough to tell the pink-haired kunoichi that the waters had been stirred in one way or another.

'It has to be Sasuke' was her initial perception a few days before. Even in the face of his defiant childhood friend, Naruto had refused to give up, and even declared that their next meeting was likely to end in mutual destruction. The part of this that made Sakura squirm was that he didn't seem slightly fazed by his own notion. Was he truly prepared to die for his friend? Even when that friend promised nothing but misery, death and destruction of the village he once called home? There was always one title that somebody with that attitude earned, and that title was 'Hokage'. Most Hokage of the past had willingly given their life to protect the people and the village that they held dear:

Senju Tobirama, the Nidaime Hokage, had sacrificed himself to the Kinkaku Force of Kumogakure so that his students could escape and protect Konoha during the First Great Shinobi World War.

Sarutobi Hiruzen, the Sandaime Hokage, used his body as a vessel in which to seal off, and subsequently render useless, the arms of Orochimaru after he had attacked Konoha in an alliance with Sunagakure. The sealing jutsu used required the life of its user.

Namikaze Minato, the Yondaime Hokage, gave his life so that the power of the Kyuubi no Youko would be sealed inside his infant son, an action that, much like Sarutobi, had averted the destruction of Konohagakure.

Naruto's own resolve was equal to these three men, if not greater; and his selflessness was something to be admired by all. He had altered the lives of many people that he had encountered, and two such people completely changed their views on life after exchanging fists with the blonde genin:

Gaara, Kazekage of Sunagakure, originally believed his only way to continue his existence in life was to kill those who threatened it. After realising that Naruto was a jinchuuriki like himself and how he handled his isolation, Gaara adopted his newfound friend's belief. His role as the Kazekage, after actively seeking to grasp it, allowed people to finally see him as a person.

Secondly, Hyuuga Neji, who believed that a person's fate was sealed at birth, changed his mindset after his defeat at the hands of a 'failure and a dropout', i.e. Naruto. Eventually, he came to see the virtues of team building and friendship; even going so far as to repair his relations with the main Hyuuga household.

That was just the kind of person Naruto was. Even when he was totally unaware of it, people he had come across were admiring his tenacity and his determination that so few could continue keeping. He was now a hero of Konoha, and one of its finest shinobis thanks to his defeat of Nagato, the controller of the Six Paths of Pain. Even after all those tribulations, he was still the Naruto that everybody knew.

But, just as Sakura had recalled, something changed once Sasuke was declared an international criminal. He had become quieter; he would trudge through the streets with his hands idly lying in his pockets, staring intently at the ground with a small frown. Worst of all, his appetite for ramen had decreased. While his appearance at Ichiraku's continued, he would either have less, or he would turn up fewer times a week than usual.

After her 'discussion' with Tsunade regarding the blonde's change, she decided to get to the bottom of it by talking to the cause.

The Day Before

Sakura exited the threshold before the Hokage Tower, kitted out in her normal medic outfit of a red vest with an underlying beige t-shirt and purple skirt, and scanned over the streets that led away from her location. The streets were still bustling with activity as wed couples walked at a leisurely pace as their children ran hyperactive circles around them, and elderly folk made the laborious trek back to their home with their week's worth of shopping. Chattering housewives blocked every other doorway as they filled each other in on the latest family happenings and recent events. The residual chatter from all these sources flooded the area and made it hard to discern any single voice from another, like trying to single out a single unique bird call in amongst a 100-strong flock.

'Ramen' was her immediate thought, and so she began her slow jog in the direction of Ichiraku's. Still unsure of her teammate's real location, she had managed to catch Nara Shikamaru on her way. The man with the dark, pineapple styled hair was lying against a wall with his head back. He was staring up into the clear azure sky with a small pout on his lips and a creased brow as if in deep thought.

Sakura came to an abrupt stop, her boots skidding across the gravel. The noise caught the man's attention, and he shifted his gaze to the young woman's eyeline, which lay just below his own. "Shikamaru, have you seen Naruto recently?" she asked with a concerned look.

Shikamaru just shrugged his shoulders, making sure his hands never left the sanctity of his pants pockets. "Last time I saw him was yesterday, kicking rocks as he walked toward his apartment." Shikamaru sighed with indignation, "I swear he's getting more troublesome than Temari. Whatever beef he's got, it must be pretty bad, he's hardly let anything get to him before."

Sakura nodded in agreement, focussing her eyesight back down the street for the sake of the search. Shikamaru noticed the frown Sakura's face held, easily noting that she was worried for her remaining teammate. Despite all the beatings and miniscule putdowns Sakura would bestow upon Naruto, Shikamaru knew that Sakura truly cared for the blonde shinobi. What annoyed him about it, though, was that she would never openly admit it for the sake of a non-existent part of her dignity. Of course, it would be too troublesome for him to get involved in such problematic friendships without getting bashed over the head himself, be it by Sakura or even Ino. The latter would simply complain that snooping around for the gossip was her job and hers alone.

"I really have to ask, Sakura." Shikamaru began again, gaining the medic's attention once more. "What happened on that trip you made? It's easy enough to tell that something went on and that it's shaken him up. But if you figured out what, then you could all talk to him."

Sakura raised an eyebrow to the totally third-person directive. She opened her mouth to ask why the Nara had exempt himself from the sentence, but he beat her to the punch. "Far too troublesome for me to bother with it all." This earned a disconcerting look from Sakura, who began to walk away in slow and short-paced steps.

"Since it's so troublesome for you, Shikamaru, then I don't see the point in me telling you anything", Sakura remarked with a cheeky and almost snide grin, throwing the shadow master's words back at him. Shikamaru just shrugged his shoulders again as he saw Sakura's figure mix into the bustling crowd and out of sight. With a small sigh, he reverted his eyes back up to the near-cloudless sky and continued his one-sided staring contest with the blue canvas that draped itself high above the village.

'Some help he was', Sakura inwardly grunted as she once again picked up her pace.

Sakura didn't come across anybody else familiar to her for another twenty minutes; by which time she had found an empty Ichiraku stand, along with an even more befuddled Ayame, who herself was concerned about the deterioration of Naruto's current level of ramen ingestion. The only information Sakura got from the father and daughter pair was that their best customer had visited them that morning and left them with only the money to pay for the meal and a timid 'thank you' to boot. Sakura continued her search, but not before Ayame made an eager, almost desperate plea for her to take care of Naruto out of genuine concern for his welfare.

It was during Sakura's contemplation of Naruto's possible locations that she came across Hyuuga Neji, who was walking with an air of panache and sincerity that carved a way through the crowd like an invisible wall of chakra had been erected in front of him. At first he simply looked like a nobleman with a completely snobby attitude, at least that's what Sakura first thought before she saw the white Gi top, Konoha hitai-ate and lavender-white eyes minus the pupils.

"Hey, Neji!" Sakura took advantage of the wide berth that the branch prodigy had been allowed by the passers-by to get close enough to engage in conversation. Neji blinked at Sakura's approach, his curiosity over why she of all people would want to talk to him slowly becoming written all over his face. Sakura took a moment to catch her breath after her non-stop jogging and people-dodging through the village hotspots. Neji looked on with patience as he allowed Sakura time to collect herself.

"Have…have you seen Naruto around today by any chance? I've been looking for him everywhere and nobody's seen him since this morning." Sakura took a few more deep breaths before lifting herself up and putting on a pleading smile.

Neji blinked once more before he finally opened his mouth, "I'm afraid I have not seen anything of Naruto since he returned with you from your... self-imposed mission." Neji's eyebrows closed in by a fraction, making it all too clear to Sakura which 'mission' he was referring to. Sakura caught wind of this, and briefly averted her gaze in the hope of straying away from that tense subject. Neji knew it was something Sakura felt she was compelled to do, albeit without any forethought as to how Naruto would feel or react. And in all honesty, it went against some morals that he stood for.

"Erm…right," Sakura nervously smiled, "Has…Hinata said anything to you about where he could be?" Sakura's nervousness increased under the pressure that Neji was putting on her, despite the fact all he had done was narrowed his eyes at her and made his tone minutely stronger. Her left hand shot up and rubbed her right forearm like it had an underlying itch.

Neji, never one to be subtle, replied straightforwardly, "No. Hinata-sama still decides to remain quiet when Naruto becomes the topic of conversation. As much as I would like to say that I know where he is, there is nothing I can tell you." Sakura's eyes dropped in disappointment, but then the thought immediately hit her as Neji began to walk away. She was talking to a Hyuuga, and there was a certain Kekkei Genkai that Hyuuga's possessed.

"Neji, wait!" Sakura held a hand out as if to grasp an invisible wire that protruded from the back of the Jounin. Neji closed his eyes and reluctantly stopped. Sakura walked around him and looked into his lavender orbs again. Neji was confused at Sakura's gaze to say the least and pulled his head back slightly at the interrogating gaze that the pink-haired kunoichi now held.

"Could you use your Byakugan?" Sakura pointed at his eyes with minor elation. Neji raised an inquisitive eyebrow.

"If you do a quick sweep of the neighbourhood you can probably find him!" Sakura's over joyous chirps were met with yet another stern look from Neji, who folded his arms.

"Out of the question", he bluntly remarked. Sakura's pointing arm flopped down to her side and her once wide eyes now transformed into a half-lidded and lifeless stare.

"Why not?" Sakura suddenly found another burst of energy. "Please, Neji! Just this once! You know, Tenten told me her thoughts about you that you might like to know…", she cooed with a hand cupped to the side of her mouth. That little statement caught his attention, if only for a hundredth of a second, before he averted his gaze with the tiniest of blushes that only a Byakugan or Sharingan could see.

"I have no interest in what my teammates say about me outside of missions", he quipped, holding his chin high with majestic grace. He shot another look down at Sakura, whose face glowed with blatant disbelief. But his stance never faltered as he continued, "Besides, a Hyuuga does not use their Byakugan for such trivial purposes."

"Oh, come on!" Sakura waved her arms about in protest, "Just a short look around and I'll be satisfied!"

Neji closed his eyes to avoid the annoying glares the medic was pushing in his direction, "I have no reason to do such things, because-"

"Because why?" Sakura cut in before Neji could finish. Neji opened his eyes once more, but backed it up with a very small smile of mockery.

"Because he's standing right behind you."

All of Sakura's motor functions ceased the second Neji finished. Her newfound stare of astonishment travelled from Neji's eyes and downward until the sleeve of his Gi became the sole object in her focal point. Neji, however, smiled a little more at the somewhat over-the-top reaction from Sakura before he nodded at Naruto and continued on his way, melting away into the crowd. All of a sudden, Sakura's world only consisted of herself, the metre of empty space around her, and her inner self, which had surfaced and had begun to laugh at her.

"You total doofus!" The voice taunted and trailed off into hysterical laughter, "I'll be remembering that one for a while!"

"Sakura-chan", Naruto's slightly hoarse voice called out in an uncharacteristically dead tone. Sakura was roused from her trance and slowly spun on the spot, bringing more and more of her teammate into focus.

Naruto was wearing his standard orange and black attire, minus the hitai-ate, with his blonde, dishevelled hair shining like a second sun that reflected onto his facial features. Sakura was taken aback as she saw Naruto without any sort of quirks to indicate a currently cheerful disposition. His brow was slightly creased, dare she say it into a frown, and his eyes looked unjustifiably empty in order to match his flat mouth line. His hands were stuffed deep into his pockets thanks to his slouched shoulders.

Sakura performed a quick up-down look of her friend and automatically her face twisted to show her disbelief. He looked so lifeless and un-Naruto like that she wasn't even sure that it was the young man himself. For only a short moment did she honestly think it might have been Konohamaru under a henge, but she recalled seeing him and his team with Ebisu not ten minutes ago as they sped over some rural rooftops.

Only when she knew it was Naruto in the flesh did the desire to lamp him one over the head for sneaking up on her come to mind. She had been searching for the best part of an hour for him, and he had instantly found her with not much trouble. She could, however, attribute that to many different things. Maybe Shikamaru had seen him and informed him that she was searching for him. Or maybe he had returned to Ichiraku and been informed by Teuchi and Ayame. Either that, or he had heard her infernal bugging of Neji and gone to investigate. None of that mattered now, since he had found her so easily, and it made her tick. She started to clench her fist, but seeing his disheartened face made the sadness feel contagious, and she relaxed. If he had his normal mask on, she knew she would have done it and only got a small bout of whining in response. But this time his face showed he was in no mood for tomfoolery, and she worried she might get it if she pushed her luck.

"Hey, Naruto. I've, er…been looking for you." Sakura nervously smiled.

"So I heard", Naruto deadpanned. The demeanour in which he spoke really put Sakura on the ropes, she couldn't figure out how to work with this version of Naruto. He seemed like Shino, but with an underlying layer of simmering discontent.

"How have you been doing?" Sakura kept up her own feeble smile in an attempt to lighten the low mood of the air surrounding them.

"Okay…I suppose. I need to be somewhere soon, so I just wanted to ask you something." Naruto's gaze didn't give as he spoke, indicating his genuine sincerity.

'This had better not be about a date', she begged, 'I bet he's put on this lowly, depressed act just to make me feel sorry for him. And then, BAM! He's going to put on that massive grin and ask me out. Nice try, Naruto, but I'm not that thick.'

"Would you mind coming over to my place tomorrow night?" Sakura was suddenly taken aback. A date…yes; she'd definitely expect that, but an invitation to his apartment? Out of the blue? No way, something fishy was going on here, she was sure of it.

"Er…why do you ask?" Sakura tried to calm herself, but her shaky voice gave away her anxiety.

Naruto shrugged his shoulders like his invitation was nothing special. "I just wanted to ask you something. It's…pretty important." On the spot, she had no time to make any guesses about what the question could be, so she decided to go with it.

"Why not just ask me now?" She held her hands out with her palms up, as if to compromise.

Naruto simply shook his head, "No. I need to ask you in private." Now Sakura was definitely getting anxious, and her curiosity increased with the desire to know this question he seemed so eager to ask.

"Erm…" Sakura suddenly felt on the spot from Naruto's insistence.

"I'll be expecting you at eight. Please be there…Sakura-chan." That was all Naruto said as he turned his back to her and slowly trundled away. Sakura was completely frozen at Naruto's sheer forcefulness. Never, in the time they had known each other, had he ordered her to do something in the way he just had…ever. Not only that, he had spoken to her politely. Naruto wouldn't know polite if the word were branded on his forehead like the Hyuuga's Caged Bird Seal.

The independent, headstrong part of Sakura finally came alive, burning a frown into her face and making a dash in the direction that Naruto had made his exit. But even as she defiantly manoeuvred her way through the torrents of people, she knew she had probably lost him. After multiple shoves and catching some harsh words coming her way, she reached a clearing. She quickly scanned around her, but there was no sight of an orange-clad blonde-haired teenager anywhere.

"What was that all about?" She asked herself in between deep breaths, feeling defeated that Naruto had hardly explained a word.

Sakura spent the rest of that day, as well as most of the next, seriously thinking about what Naruto was getting so down about. She looked down at her watch, which read one-minute-to-eight, and looked back up at the grey door in front of her.

She was stood outside Naruto's new apartment and thought about how much easier it was to reach. The new apartment sat on the second floor of a rejuvenated area of the downtown estates. Fortunately, with Naruto's rise in popularity, he had managed to secure a better place with a kinder landlord, who imposed no harsh rates of interest and no faulty locks for people to take advantage of and easily sabotage his belongings.

Sakura had changed her outfit to her ninja get-up for the sake of practicality. Her beige skirt gently flapped in the calm breeze as she stood in the open air, revealing her mid-thigh length shorts, and her red vest was zipped down to her collarbone level, revealing her smooth-looking cream tinted skin.

She gently rapped her knuckles against the door of Naruto's apartment three times in rapid succession, a telltale sign of her impatience towards finding out the reason for the sudden request of her audience. She heard some barely audible footfalls from the other side as they made contact with the thin wooden floor, inadvertently causing Sakura to focus on the gap underneath the door. Gradually the steps were increasing in volume, and Sakura suddenly realised that the sounds were the only thing taking up her concentration once she became totally unaware of the door before slowly creaking inward.

"Sakura", Naruto said in his deadpan tone, swiftly achieving the attention of his medic-nin teammate's attention. Sakura quickly shook her head with a gasp as her eyes finally locked with the unforgettable blue orbs that still made her feel a small warmth whenever she saw them.

Naruto's gaze was one of reluctance, and he still maintained the small frown that he had recently adopted as his new default look. She quickly scanned his features, taking note of his lack of even the tiniest of smiles, and nervously smiled. "Hey, Naruto."

There followed a few seconds of extremely awkward silence as both teenagers tried to face each other down with inquisitive glances. The one thing that seemed so off about this encounter was that Naruto wasn't jumping for joy at the fact that the girl of his admiration was visiting his apartment, despite being asked, nee practically told, to do so.

"Please", he said as he stood back and opened the door further towards him to allow room for his guest to enter, motioning her through with his free right hand. Sakura allowed herself a single nod and took the steps necessary to end up in the middle of the hall of his small accommodation. She turned on the spot to scan the young man who had begun to close the door behind her. His hair was as dishevelled as ever but had rapidly lost its shine, and the tight black t-shirt he wore, which complimented his toned chest and abdomen, was creased from its over-usage. He still had his trademark orange pants on, with the hems of the legs still hovering just above his ankle line. His boots had a few specks of mud along the edges of the soles, indicating their constant use.

"Sakura?" Naruto took notice of the kunoichi eyeing up his figure. Her eyebrows were crooked to give her a look of pity. She'd never seen the teen so messy before, aside from when he had been flung across the ground from one of her own chakra enhanced punches. She shook her head once again to redirect her focus back to the young man stood but a few metres from her.

"Hm?" she raised her eyebrows back up, giving her a look of expectance, the expectance that Naruto might say something meaningful.

"Do you want a drink?" He pointed his right thumb back over his shoulder in the direction of his kitchen. His tone was still low and held no real passion or energy, he sounded like he had expended all his chakra. "I'm afraid there's not much to choose from since I haven't gone shopping this week. It's milk or water for the moment."

Sakura forced out an empty laugh, fully aware that it wasn't a joke. She had to do something to lighten up the mood, but any idea she had before arriving had flown out her ear and been blown away by the wind.

"Er, water will be fine, Naruto." She let her fake smile keep itself plastered over her face as Naruto turned on his heel with a weak nod and headed in the direction of the kitchen. As soon as he was out of sight, Sakura's face had dropped once again. She began doing small pirouettes on her heels as she took in her surroundings, bringing her hands in front of her stomach and grasping her forearms.

"Make yourself comfortable, Sakura. I'll be there in a second." She quickly turned to the source of the noise, making sure she could take in the information. She nodded to the uninhabited corridor in front of her and walked further into the apartment, briefly noting the single closed door at the far end of the corridor. She made a quick right turn out of the corridor, and then another left turn to find the living room. It was cosy but small, with a sofa lying against the right hand wall underneath a head-height row of windows, and a small sat by the adjacent wall. Another smaller chair occupied the far left corner of the room, and had a small table directly in front of it. Propped up on the table were three rolled-up scrolls. She didn't want to interfere with his privacy, and so planted herself on the nearest couch seat, bringing her feet up together and resting her lower legs just below and to the left of her thighs.

As she had been moving, her nervousness had increased threefold, and all because of two little things:

First, he was still acting maturely and with some form of manners, which was nothing like the Naruto of the modern day, or indeed any day.

Secondly, he didn't add the trademark 'chan' suffix to her name.

She began to fidget with her fingernails as she heard his footsteps close the distance between them. Finally, he walked around the connecting wall holding two glasses of transparent fluid; his pace wasn't rushed, but nor was it sluggish. His stride was slack, but he could be easily excused of this since he was in his own home, but opposed to his confident walking style outside, he looked like a complete shambles.

With a tiny flicker of the edges of his lips, he handed the glass in his right hand to the kunoichi, who accepted with her own kind of thin smile and a feeble "Thank you".

Naruto sat at the other end of two-seater, opting to keep his feet firmly planted on the ground. He sighed as he let the couch take his weight, and leaned forward to place both his forearms on his level thighs. He grasped both hands around his glass and began to turn it counter-clockwise using his fingertips.

Sakura took only a small sip of the cool liquid before attempting to delicately balance it on her left knee. Upon realising it wouldn't work, she did the safe thing of keep a firm hand on it. She looked back over at Naruto, who still let his eyes burn a hole in the black monitor of the TV.

"So," Sakura began, "what's been troubling you?"

Naruto's eyes shifted in the direction of his guest without actually focussing on her. He scoffed as he looked back to wall ahead of him.

"You noticed, I take it?" he said in a totally unsurprised tone.

Sakura shifted her upper body to face him. "Naruto, people are bound to notice something's wrong when our number one hyperactive ninja is no longer hyperactive. Come on, even Sai asked me what was wrong with you, and you know what's he's like around emotions." Her voice carried impatience and a hint of annoyance. It was so obvious, and yet Naruto was acting like absolutely nothing had happened. Naruto accepted the facts with a slow nod of his head, but still he refused to look his friend in the eye.

"Fair enough. Why didn't you go ask baa-chan? You're her apprentice after all." Naruto practically shunned her back with his remark.

Sakura frowned at the 'suggestion', "Don't give me that, Naruto," her voice increased in volume, "You know I would have gone to Tsunade-sama first, and that's probably why she didn't say anything to me after I went to ask her." She felt her anger rise as her fingers constricted further around her glass.

"Ah," Naruto let his smile grow, "at least she's keeping her promise." He spoke the line in a fairly audible whisper; she supposed it was his intent for her to hear him despite apparently trying his best to cover it up. He took another small swig from his glass.

"What's going on Naruto?" She leaned to the side and extended her left arm out, placing her barely-touched glass onto the wooden floorboards. "Why are you acting like this all of a sudden?" She brought herself back up and leaned in towards the blonde shinobi until their heads sat half-a-metre apart.

"Is it Sasuke?" she practically whispered, as if the topic was still an S-Rank taboo. She moved her hands out in front of her to keep her balance.

Naruto finally acknowledged Sakura's proximity and turned his head to meet her shimmering emerald eyes. They showed both worry and demand, and refused to stop boring into Naruto's dilated pupils. But as quickly as he'd looked toward her, his gaze once again turned to the TV.

"No" he said unemotionally. Sakura huffed out her nostrils in disappointment as she brought her body back upright.

"Don't lie to me, Naruto", she said in a scornful manner, folding her arms just under her chest with a scowl written in her eyebrows.

Naruto didn't even twitch from the remark. "I'm not", he replied rather nonchalantly, "When did I last lie to you, Sakura?"

His voice became extremely demanding, almost ordering. It sounded confident, as if Naruto already knew what the answer was going to be. The sudden forcing of the question made Sakura pull back briefly before she pondered her memories. The answer was exiting her lips within seconds, "Fine", she huffed, "But there's always a first for everything."

Naruto's arm froze as it brought his glass up to his lips. He could feel heat building up in his ears as his temper began to flare. He slowly leaned forward, placing his glass on the floor by his right foot. "I didn't ask you over to argue about my ability to tell the truth, you know. I'm being honest by the way. Sasuke has nothing to do with it. Well…not everything at least, but I meant everything I said back there."

Sakura recoiled with a small inaudible gasp as memories flooded back of what Naruto had said to Sasuke after their Rasengan/Chidori clash. How he practically guaranteed that their lives would likely be lost as a result of their next meeting. She flung her legs out from underneath her and mirrored Naruto's position, placing the soles of her boots firmly on the ground and letting her outstretched hands lie on her knees. She twisted 45-degrees so that she was almost facing her friend.

"You're really serious about this aren't you? You're really willing to risk your life over him?" she narrowed her eyes to display her scepticism.

Naruto let his eyes meet hers again, and quickly scanned her upper body. Even after all this time, he couldn't help but admire her figure. Her bubblegum hair shimmered from the ambient outside street lighting that had leaked through the windows above them, giving them a partial gold lining. Her glistening green eyes still tried to burn holes in his corneas, and her red tank top was complimenting her athletic figure. Of the many thoughts he couldn't avoid, 'She's beautiful' was one that liked to repeat itself every few seconds.

This time, he maintained his dead-on stare and answered directly to her face with a minute nod, "Yes". His voice was so confident and unfaltering; it gave the kunoichi a slight shiver down her spine as she saw those menacing blue irises practically trying to evaporate her ocular fluid.

With a slight nervous shake, she edged closer to him, dragging her body over the soft fabric of the couch. "Why?" Her tone was far from delicate, but it couldn't be considered scornful either.

He turned his head to the opposite wall once again and spoke as he laboriously shifted his weight forward to get himself back up on his feet. "That kind of brings me to why I wanted you to come here", he said as he rose out of his seat. She didn't respond, and only felt the cushioning of the sofa rise as it relaxed after being relieved of Naruto's weight. She let her head follow his movements as he walked over to the other side of the room. He leant back against the wall next to the TV with folded arms and bent his right leg, letting the sole of his boot lie flat against it. He gave her a straight look that left no tells as to his current thoughts; she felt frozen to the spot from such a hard look, and that initial shiver in her spine returned once again.

"I'm going to ask you two questions, Sakura. I have a feeling that the way you answer the first one will automatically answer the second."

Sakura found herself tongue-tied; the way that Naruto spoke to her with such an unseen and unheard air of authority made her feel like she was sat in an ANBU interrogation room. Her mouth refused to move, defying her brain and showing its own misplaced anticipation of the coming questions. Naruto couldn't see the mental confusion Sakura's mind was under, and simply took her silence as a cue to begin.

"What am I to you?" His question was harshly shunted from his lips, his low but sharp tone eliciting only a befuddled stare from his teammate, which was soon cut off by a single blink. Sakura had hoped for a question that didn't require deciphering, and she could only assume that the desired answer was the most simple and obvious.

"Well, er…" She began, trying to peg what the relationship between her and Naruto presently consisted of, "You're my teammate…my teammate and my friend." Sakura looked back up as she heard a grunt from the young man across from her. At first, she thought it was a sound of understanding, but the way he sharply shook his head told her the complete opposite. She knit her brow as visual display of her confusion, but the elaboration she needed was slow to come.

"No", Naruto quickly murmured. "I mean what am I to you? I'm not talking about literal stuff here, Sakura. Yes, I'm your teammate and-" Naruto's diaphragm bucked as he tried say the final word of his sentence, but his feelings had finally started to catch up with him, "Friend." Naruto allowed himself a quick shrug of the shoulders before continuing. "But those are physical things, things we already know and can't deny…they're pure truth. I'm talking about subjective opinion…what, in your mind, do I entail as an object?" Sakura's dumbfounded stare told Naruto everything he needed to know. He could tell she wasn't even going to bother answering the question, but he didn't know why.

Sakura knew, however. It was for the simple reason that Naruto's sudden fluidity with words had made her question herself. When did Naruto know about words like 'subjective' and 'entail'? And since when did he know when and how to use them properly in sentences? Her befuddlement caused her to pause before she could start thinking of her answer.

"Er…" And that was when Sakura really started to think. Other than what she just said, what exactly did Naruto mean to her? As she trundled through her memories of their past adventures as teammates, she tried to build her answer based on what she had seen him accomplish. Unfortunately, the incident with Gaara and Shukaku was something she never witnessed, and she was too embroiled in mourning a supposedly dead Sasuke to see what he had done on the bridge against Zabuza and Haku. The burning and unrelenting stare that Sakura felt on her face didn't help her think any quicker, and as such she shifted her gaze towards the door on the opposite side of the room to her left. Even as she recalled more recent times, times such as Pain's attack, and what she heard he had done to Kakuzu, she still couldn't peg what Naruto truly meant to her. Yes, he was her friend, and probably her biggest supporter, but she wasn't sure how it all came to an answer that he would accept. What exactly did he want her to say? If it were an opinion that she held close to her heart and only wanted herself to know, then she would prefer to keep it that way.

"You don't want to answer, do you?" Sakura's gaze shot back to the teen across from her, but his eyes were now focussed straight ahead, looking out the window in a half-transfixed state. "Okay, forget it. Your silence pretty much answered the question for you." The phrase was shot out in a tone of contempt.

Sakura found herself beyond confused. Naruto's cryptic and standoffish statements only made her more curious as to what he wanted to talk to her about, and the fact that he looked so serious and…even upset, made her worry even more. She still wasn't sure what could have caused him to become so down. It was at that moment that Sakura realised that she had been sat in stunned silence, something that Naruto had never pushed her to. Because of that, as well as her temper, she suddenly found her fire again.

"What are you talking about? You're not making any sense, Naruto." Sakura hardened her expression and let her eyes follow Naruto's movement across the room and to the window. She remained sat down, and continued to shoot an equally inquisitive glare at Naruto's whiskered right cheek. Naruto turned his head enough so that both of his eyes could see the unhappy look pasted on Sakura's face.

"Then I'll spell it out to you." Naruto's cold tone never faltered as he spoke, it in fact sounded even harsher as he looked back out of the window sat before his eyes. "The fact you didn't even answer the question has told me three things. I don't know whether they're true or not, but they're the best things I can think of." Sakura continued to look up at her teammate with a determined stare; but underneath, she found herself eager to hear these supposed messages that Naruto had gleaned out of thin air.

"The first thing is that I don't mean anything to you at all. Not saying anything tells me that you can't think of a single thing involving me that's worth thinking about." Naruto spoke confidently at the windowpane a foot away from his face, the heat of his breath condensing on the cool transparent surface before vanishing like a thin veil of smoke. "The second thing that I can assume is that, for some reason, you don't trust me. In other words, you don't think I'm somebody worth telling those sorts of thoughts to. That is…if you had any thoughts in the first place."

Sakura narrowed her eyes in disbelief and held her mouth slightly open, a mouth from which no words came; those words lay dormant in her throat, held back by her internal shock. She couldn't believe that Naruto was looking so seriously into the matter. The blonde definitely meant something to her, but his sudden demand of her opinion didn't allow her the time to prepare any kind of answer. Unfortunately, because she had frozen, Naruto had taken that as her answer.

"And both of those", Naruto paused to take in a deep breath that gave him a visage of calm, one that deeply contrasted his current attitude, "Lead into the third thing: The possibility that, maybe, you don't even respect me as a person."

Before Sakura's mind could catch up, her flaring temper had forced her onto her feet and to walk in Naruto's direction with hard steps while she removed the glove from her right hand. Upon hearing those stern footsteps on the floor, Naruto turned to finally lock eyes with his teammate once more, but found himself only mildly surprised as he felt her hand searing a sharp stinging sensation across a large area of his left cheek. The impact of Sakura's hard slap moved his head only a few inches, but the heat that quickly spread over his skin told him he was lucky to have not been flung into a wall. Even though Sakura was herself quite surprised by her actions, Naruto's harsh implications made her seethe with an anger she never before knew. Having Sasuke reject her all those years ago had, indeed, upset her; but the way Naruto antagonized her with such mean words and expressions made her even angrier than when Sai had badmouthed Sasuke in front of her. However, she couldn't peg as to why it was now, of all times, that she felt so livid.

The only thing that Naruto had done that remotely resembled flinching was to close his eyes. Without moving his head, he opened them once more and swivelled his dulled sapphires to look upon the fiery jade stare of his attacker.

"How dare you", her hiss sounded almost like it was whispered. "How could you even think of saying that?" She couldn't believe that Naruto would think such degrading things about her. He was the saviour of Konoha three times over: the Kyuubi attack, the Oto/Suna invasion, and Pain/Nagato as well. Even after she found out about Naruto's tenant, she wanted to be there to help him, and although her attitudes never came out into clear light, she more than respected him as a shinobi. However, 'shinobi' was not the word Naruto had used; he had said 'person'.

She opened her mouth to prolong her chastising, but Naruto had suddenly squared on her and took advantage of her motionless arms by grabbing her around the wrists and locking her arms by her sides, lest she try to hit him yet again. Naruto had to lean forward in order to maintain his grip, a movement which brought his nose an approximate foot away from hers.

"I'll tell you exactly how I could think that." The new frown that adorned Naruto's face rivalled Sakura's, leaving them in a mutual stare down. Despite that, Sakura found her nerves fraying as Naruto spoke without any increase in volume other than to emphasise the word 'exactly'.

"One: When I don't deserve it, and even when I have done absolutely nothing to wrong you or anybody else, you end up using me as a punching bag. I'll let what you just did slide for the time being." Sakura wanted to object to that. In her opinion, a lot of Naruto's actions deserved some kind of small, albeit playful punishment. She opened her mouth again, but Naruto caught it and elaborated. "After I beat Nagato, do you remember what the first thing you did when Kakashi-sensei brought me back was?" Sakura knew, but she preferred not to hear it. "You hit me! For no reason at all!"

"You tried to be the hero and took him on by yourself!" Sakura shot back in greater volume. Naruto's jaw stiffened as he remembered one of the reasons that he had wished to take out Nagato on his own. With a deep tone and underlying growl, Naruto spoke.

"He didn't kill your master, though, did he?" Sakura's eyes minutely widened in understanding, but it did nothing to quell the anger simmering inside her. Naruto could feel all his memories bombarding him and bringing up previously suppressed feelings and emotions. He couldn't stand it any longer. For years, he had been the subject of ridicule from both his seniors and peers, and he had kept his feelings relatively well hidden; but it should have been common knowledge that even the toughest nut must crack at some point.

"Two: You and a lot of others still like to treat me as if I'm a clueless idiot." Regrettably, Sakura had to partially agree with what he was saying. "Let me tell you something. If I were as stupid as you thought me to be, then I'd be in the hands of Akatsuki right now. Hell, I'd probably be dead." Sakura tried to take advantage of Naruto's small self-distraction by shaking her arms free. Unfortunately for her, Naruto had the mind to split his concentration and keep his grasp tight, even as he thought about what he had to say.

"Three!" He suddenly shouted, the ferocity of which made the kunoichi stop her struggling; to her credit, Sakura had managed to get her hands in front of her and in line with her shoulders, also forcing Naruto's hands upwards. She looked back into his eyes, seeing an expression that she herself had worn many times. It was pain, emotional pain, born from the release of pent up feelings. She could see the small glistening of fresh tears building up above his lower eyelids. It was such a saddening sight, to see the one pillar of support that you would never believe to falter suddenly crack in the way they were, she couldn't help but let her expression of anger drop a few notches.

"You and a lot of others also find it acceptable to lie to my face when you find it most convenient for you." Due to the sudden silence brought on by the cessation of struggling, Naruto's voice had slightly lowered. Sakura was stunned at Naruto's supposed distrust of their friends and herself; she couldn't understand how he was looking so far into some petty Q&A outcomes. Even so, she knew that some of his observations were, in fact, very close to the mark; but she couldn't understand as to how he had become so perceptive, or what the main catalyst to his sudden behavioural change was. She narrowed her eyes as she took her teammate's silence to mean that he had ended his argument.

"What's wrong with you, Naruto?" Sakura's demand was blurted out with higher volume than she had meant, but that, as well as her high-pitched and almost desperate tone, seemed to hit home, "Why are you acting like this?" Naruto couldn't believe Sakura was being so ignorant of the trouble she had caused.

"Because I'm tired, Sakura." Naruto said quietly, but still with huge strain in his tone, "I've had enough of people stepping on me for their own gain, using me to suit their needs, making me the scapegoat and pretending they're never at fault. I despise the fact that I'm barely taken seriously because of this thing sealed inside me!" Sakura's eyes quickly glanced down at Naruto's stomach, the location of the Yondaime's seal, before looking back to his twisted face, "Even though I try to pass it off, everything that has happened to me has had some kind of effect, not that anybody ever cared enough to notice; but I wouldn't dare dump my problems on another simply for pity or attention." Sakura facially winced, sensing the not-so-subtle jab at how she had commonly used him as a support for her issues.

"I can't take this treatment anymore! I refuse to be taken lightly any longer, and I'm making sure everybody knows it…starting with you. That brings me to the second question."

Sakura stood paralysed as she saw Naruto's eyes darken; it was a scene considerably reminiscent of her other teammate…and it scared her. The young man stood before her, with his painfully tight grasp on her wrists as he cruelly, but tearfully, stared her down into submission was nothing like the kind-hearted shinobi she had oddly found herself caring for more and more over the past few months. Naruto was one of the few remaining constants in her life outside of her shinobi duties, and to have such a support was a rare thing that had to be treasured. One would be deemed a fool to do something to jeopardise that kind of bond. What could have possibly happened to bring about this different Narut-

"Why did you tell me you loved me?" He suddenly growled as his cheeks started to glisten from his trickling tears.

The question cut through her like a wind-enhanced kunai. Her eyebrows jumped for her hairline as she made a sharp gasp. She quickly thought back to the time that they stood in the snow in Tetsu no Kuni. She had confessed her love for him with the hope that he would go home and stop pursuing the promise he had made her. However, she, as well as he, knew that she was being insincere. He had rejected her, which had partially surprised her, but he had taken it as a bump on the chin and ignored it since.

"Naruto", she said inside a whisper, but her somewhat calm voice wasn't enough to loosen the jinchuuriki's grip around her wrists. The situation suddenly felt even more hopeless for the kunoichi; anything she could say she felt was likely to only go against her. What could she possibly say? 'Yeah, I faked a love confession so you could get out of my way while I killed your best friend'? What kind of person would that make her seem like? The problem there was that that had, in fact, been her plan from the off.

"What was going on in your head to make you think you could just lie to my face like that? Or did you hope that I was simply too stupid to notice?" Even though Sakura wished to answer, Naruto closed his eyes and kept going with a volume that the young woman in front of him could barely hear herself, "It doesn't matter to you, does it? You don't really care about how I would feel about anything, do you? I'll tell you now, Sakura, I've…never…been so hurt in my life."

Sakura was forced out of her reverie as she found herself losing her balance from the force with which Naruto pushed her away from him. As she found her feet once again, she looked back at Naruto in frustration, but found his eyes of ice-cold blue nonexistent, replaced by a spine-chilling light red. Even when unrestrained and at a distance, Sakura still found herself stuck to the spot from her mild shock. Inside, though, she was broiling with more pent up anger and couldn't believe that Naruto was suddenly treating her as if he were an arrogant bandit.

"You don't think twice about doing all these things to hurt me, and yet you have the gall to pretend that you still care about my well being!" Naruto suddenly shouted out, "Why do you treat me like trash when I've done nothing but respect you and try my best to bring back the one thing you want? Why…just why, Sakura? What have I done to deserve any of this?" Naruto stood panting on his current spot as he vented his hidden feelings, his eyes projecting everything he had wanted to keep from his friends. Although the image of his burning stare was what caught Sakura's attention the most, she still had enough concentration to listen to Naruto's pained words.

"Why are you turning me into an enemy, Naruto? I'm not the only person around here who's performed some less-than-honest actions. You're making me look bad while you stand there and play the victim!" Naruto's reaction was to widen his eyes in disbelief at her words and bare his glistening teeth, an image that made the shiver in Sakura's spine return with added force; even so, she continued with her argument, "If my failure to answer you before was so hurtful, then tell me what I mean to you!"

Contrary to the tense and pressuring atmosphere, Naruto's face seemed to relax as he slowly turned his gaze to a suddenly very enticing piece of skirting board on the wall to his right. Even more surprising was the fact that the edges of his lips curled into a mirthless smile, which came with an eerily sounding scoff.

"I was hoping you'd ask that", he said almost peacefully, "I've never managed to put it into words, you know. But I'm grateful that you're putting me on the spot, because I have no choice but to tell you." Slightly straightening his posture, Naruto looked back to his teammate, red eyes still ablaze, and took a small step forward. "What do you mean to me…" He audibly pondered. His calm tone did nothing to ease Sakura's tense stance.

"To me…you're like the moon, sitting high above the darkness of my life, glowing and pure. Even if I feel lost, I can always count on seeing your face, and I can feel it light up my path and make it seem like there's nothing to worry about. Seeing you…helps me remember why I'm still alive, and reminds me of the one thing I need to accomplish that I know will make you happy; and remembering that goal keeps me going, even when I should have already fallen. Even though you do that to me, you hang so high above my head that I know I'll never be able to reach you. And it kills me to be constantly reminded that the only one who you'll allow to reach for you has done nothing for you, compared to everything I've done." Naruto's voice croaked, he felt a knot starting to build in his throat, but he refused to stop, determined to finally let her know just how much she meant to him…and how he felt about her, too.

Sakura was shocked at Naruto's vivid description. Never had someone referred to her in such a poetic and imaginative way, and it made her take a laboured breath as she tried to force back a choke. Her mind defiantly refused to believe that Naruto was capable of thinking such things, but every word seemed to put another crack in her disbelief. For every minute step that Naruto took towards her, Sakura responded by stepping back.

"When that moon disappears, you immediately change into the sun. You become my day. Even if you're only in my sight, I can still feel warmth that no one else can provide. When you're stood near me, you light the path I know must take in order to reclaim the thing you want the most. But if I get too close to you…I just get burned…over and over again!" Remembering the pain he had been caused over the course of their friendship, Naruto became louder.

Sakura's eyes began to burn from the tears she desperately tried to hold back. Because she had always taken Naruto as the silly idiot who never seemed to have an opinion, it hurt all the more to hear what he truly thought about her from his own mouth. Still Naruto pushed forward, and still Sakura tried to back away, back away from the pain she never realised that she had caused. Suddenly, a solid wall blocked her movement, and it caused her to panic at what could happen once Naruto was upon her again. Despite that small sense of dread, her mind forced her to stay put, even though the door that lead out into the hallway stood only a metre to her left. Naruto's pace picked up, driving him closer and closer. Before she knew it, he was only two metres away from her.

"You are the first reason why I get up in the morning! You are the biggest thing that makes my life worth living! I'm trying so hard to bring Sasuke back because I know it's the only thing that'll make you happy! That's what I want to give you beyond anything else! Because that's what you mean to me!" Sakura's chest heaved as her fight against her emotions became futile. Hoping against all hope that she was experiencing nothing but a nightmare; that the pain Naruto had gone through was caused by the fault of somebody else. She clamped her eyes shut and shook her head in pointless denial, even as Naruto came within feet of her.

"You knew I was doing this for you! Sai told you how I felt as well! So what do you do? You lie about the one thing that I've always dreamed of hearing!" Sakura jumped with a start as Naruto slammed his open left hand against the wall by her right ear, the noise from the impact rattling her from her self-imposed bubble of lacklustre protection. Her head snapped upwards from her jumpy reaction, some of her slowly building tears flicking into the air before landing soundlessly on the floor as she met the drilling stare of heartbreak bursting forth from Naruto's red, slitted orbs. She suddenly found herself spared of the image as Naruto closed his eyes, his teeth still open to the air from his tensed lips as his jaws began to soundlessly grind. She expected at least one more wall of noise to hit her dead on, but the next words from her distressed teammate's mouth were barely above a whisper.

"Do you have…any…idea…of how painful it is…to have the one you love more than anything in the world spit in your face like that? To realise that the person you adore has as much respect for you as they do for a sewer rat?" Naruto had promised himself that he would never cry again after Jiraiya, but thinking back to that day due to the current situation made it twenty times harder than he had hoped. He let his head hang downward in order to hide the pained twisting of his facial muscles, despite the knowledge that Sakura had already seen him crack.

The revelations were being unravelled too fast for Sakura to comprehend any sort of reply. Although she had indeed risked her friendship with Naruto to stop Sasuke from sinking further into his darkness, she had grossly underestimated the impact it would have had on her remaining teammate. He was correct about Sai's news regarding his feelings, but she had no idea that it would bloom into such a feeling that would allow the supposed knucklehead to objectify her in such a poetic manner, as if she were the very life-force that kept him going. Looking upon his broken and emotion-driven expression made her suddenly wonder just how wrong she could have been about him in other areas of their friendship. Suddenly, the thought about how a calm, composed, and even smart Naruto acted made her eagerly curious, but also staunchly afraid. What would he say to others? How would he act, especially around people like the Hokage? And most of all, how would he interact with her?

"There," Naruto's vocal chords ejected the words through his heavy breathing, which got Sakura to look back at him, "I said it." Naruto growled towards the floor, still refusing to look at the jade eyes that remained locked on his messy mop of blonde. Sakura quietly sighed with relief as Naruto brought his hand back to his side and righted his body, all the while keeping his eyes fixed on the floor. "Happy now?" It took three repetitions of Sakura silently opening and closing her mouth before she replied.

"I…I didn't know…" She started quietly, hoping that a continued line of dialogue would bring her reserved attitude back to fruition. Naruto took a step back from the bewildered pink-haired Chuunin, bringing his thoughts back under control whilst still keeping his face hidden.

"Of course you didn't", Naruto harshly responded, "You never bothered to find out nor care about how I might have felt. It's all well and good that everybody gets what they want, so long as they've trodden on Naruto in the process." Naruto ended distastefully as he reared his head to look out the window in disdain, making his monologue seem like it was directed to the whole village, his red eyes flickering over multiple landmarks that stuck out in the darkening distance. Due to Naruto calming down, Sakura finally had a chance to take stock of everything. Although she felt a definite constriction in her chest at Naruto's strained confession and the ensuing guilt, she felt unjustifiably antagonised by his words.

"Stop it, Naruto!" The desperation in her voice told him that the line should have been shouted, but what came from Sakura's lips was hardly above inside-voice volume, "I can't believe you're getting so angry over this!" She didn't expect Naruto to suddenly round on her again, eyes burning with anger and distrust.

"How the hell can you expect me to not be angry? !" The disgruntled blonde shouted back, "The woman I love faked the one thing that should never…ever be faked! How am I supposed to feel? Disappointed? Annoyed?" Naruto scoffed in disbelief at what he assumed Sakura was thinking, but he hadn't yet finished, "Try 'humiliated' and 'heartbroken', they pretty much sum up how I feel now! Let's see how you react if Sasuke said it to you, and you realised he was lying through his teeth!" A hard swing of his arm in her direction ended Naruto's rant, but Sakura had more to add from what her teammate had said.

"We're not talking about Sasuke-kun!" Sakura found her energy returning at the mention of their teammate, and it spurned her on into stepping forward and making her counter-argument, regardless of the dark and hurtful stare she was receiving from Naruto's red irises.

"Yes we are!" Naruto cut in, "Indirectly, he has everything to do with this! You told me that…that…lie…" the word was aggressively spat out in contempt, "…Just so you could get me off your case while you went to kill him! I've been doing all this to bring him back; and you tried to ruin it! You're trying to make me break my promise!" Naruto didn't expect Sakura to suddenly lunge through the metre of air between them and violently grab the front of his shirt, an action that made his eyes widen in surprise.

"Stop…thinking…about…that!" Sakura punctuated every exclaimed word, every syllable, with a hard push or pull of her arms, causing her teammates body to judder with every shake as he looked down at her half-confused, "Just stop it!" She cried out, her voice cracking once again in desperation and emphasising the new tears creeping across her skin. "Do you think you're the only one who's hurting? Try being in my shoes! Every day I can do nothing but watch as one of my teammates falls further into darkness, while the other continually hurts himself over a stupid bond!"

Naruto felt anger at Sakura's criticism, but could only comprehend how to reply since she was still giving him the occasional jolt by his shirt. Soon enough, Sakura stilled herself, keeping her grip on her teammate with her arms half-bent, keeping them a decent distance apart. Naruto's slitted rubies met Sakura's moist emeralds, and the look of pure sadness across her face made the blonde's face fall despite his simmering soreness over her confession.

"And how do you think I feel when I know the one I wanted is intent on killing me and everyone close to me?" Naruto was concentrating too hard on the pained look of his teammate to notice her use of past tense in the word 'want'; even as she finally opened up to him, albeit very slightly, he himself was still upset. Sakura looked down at her toes, almost scared to look at her teammate's face as she continued.

"Yes, I lied…I admit it…" Although he already knew, hearing her confess straight from her lips made it hurt all the more. Feeling his face involuntarily twist in mild anguish, Naruto rapidly swung his arms up and between Sakura's, breaking her grip on him before turning his back to her without a word. Sakura flinched at the sudden movement and snapped her head up to look at the back of the jinchuuriki's messy blonde mop, easily catching sight of his heaving shoulders. She knew that damage control would have to be run quickly, and she immediately blurted out her defence.

"But I did it because I wanted you to come back here, where you'd be safe! I've always been the one who's relied on you, so I wanted to do something with my own strength!" Sakura placed her open left hand on her chest as she shouted towards Naruto's back, which quickly became his face as he spun on his heel to confront her with his own new tears. Suddenly, she felt frozen to the spot as ice-cold blue eyes replaced the menacing red and sent a paralysing chill throughout her body.

"By killing my best friend? By trying to destroy one of the few connections I cherish?" Naruto sharply and defiantly shook his head, "No…I won't let you. How can somebody be Hokage if they can't even save one friend?" Naruto held up a tensing hand and extending his index finger. Sakura suddenly found herself at her wits end; once more, Naruto's stubbornness and self-righteousness had come forth, putting a block on the majority of arguments that Sakura could put forth. With her impatience rising, she unwittingly burst out.

"Be realistic, Naruto! You're not the Hokage, you're just a Genin!"

Bar Sakura's breathing after her put-down, the room suddenly fell into silence. The pinkette was expecting another retort from the knucklehead, but as she laid her eyes upon his…she immediately found herself regretting her words. Naruto's stare seemed to bore into her very soul, the light of his once bright sapphires looked to have been suddenly replaced by lifelessness and despair. His lips tightened against one another, slightly shifting his cheeks and making his whiskers look like they were freely swaying over his face.

Tonight, Sakura felt, had all gone wrong. She had never expected such a harsh confrontation, but it was because of her actions, her words, that Naruto was feeling so low. Now she understood why the Hokage hadn't said a word to her; it was because she would never understand Naruto's feelings through third-party accounts. Now she was looking at the unenergetic eyes of her teammate, creased from tears and knit eyebrows as they demonstrated the genuine hurt he had suppressed for so long. Seeing him as such pained her a lot deeper than she had expected. Why did she feel so bad? Why was her chest aching like when he left?

Without a word, Naruto took a single step in the direction of the couch to Sakura's right, bending over to pick up the glass he had placed on the floor before walking along the length of the piece of furniture to mimic the action with Sakura's abandoned glass. With a shaky sigh, Naruto gently walked across Sakura's front, not sparing her a single glance, and headed for the door leading into the hallway.

She saw his eyes again; they looked as if they were staring into nothing, like a man who had seen enough death to wish it upon himself, like a person whose very soul had been ripped out…like a man whose heart had been shattered. The image locked Sakura's feet to the wood she was stood upon; and no matter how severely her mind ordered them to move, her legs seized up, leaving her in the room as she heard Naruto's footfalls echo from beyond the doorway. Strangely enough, it was only once she realised she was alone that she was urgently pushing herself in the same direction as her teammate. The silence throughout the entire apartment was deafening, she could no longer hear the wind outside, nor even the chinking of the glasses that Naruto had reclaimed. Slowly…cautiously, she stepped towards the entrance of the kitchen.

"N…Naruto?" She asked with an uncharacteristic softness. The young man in question was stood by his sink on the right-hand wall, his back to the door and with his right hand lying on the surface next to the almost-untouched glasses. She could only make out part of his vivid hairstyle, the rest of which was blocked by his back as his head looked to the floor. The ghostly ambience around them chipped away at Sakura's sanity; all of a sudden, she found herself wanting nothing more than for her teammate to turn around with a massive grin and scream 'Gotcha!' before jokingly laughing at her. That was her wish…but it was not her reality.

"So I'm 'just a Genin' now?" Sakura barely heard him murmur the repetition of her outburst; she stood still, watching how the fingers of his idle left hand slowly tapped against the side of his leg. "That's what I've become to you? The subordinate you can use and abuse to your heart's content?" He spoke calmly as he reared his head to look at the wall in front of him. Sakura didn't know what to say; she had said the statement matter-of-factly, indicating to Naruto's current rank simply in relation to that of the village leader. However, it seemed that he had taken it as a shot to his credibility.

Naruto felt his heart tearing itself apart like paper. The woman he loved had admitted lying to him about the words he yearned to hear, she had been physically abusing him for almost four years, verbally downgrading him at many turns, acting completely oblivious to the actions he had performed in the name of both her and their friends and loved ones…and now she pulled the professional rank card despite his endeavours. Even through all the hard treatment, he still wished to chase her, holding onto that last string of hope that his acts would tantamount to something other than pain. He couldn't explain it, not even to himself; his mind had forever caught her image and told his body, his emotions, that she was worth the effort. Because of these revelations, and his own disbelief that he was putting up with everything, he began to slowly and mirthlessly laugh to himself. Sakura heard the quiet sound coming from the blonde and instinctively stood back in unease, eyeing the young man curiously.

It had ended as quickly as it had started, and Naruto looked out the window, displaying his tear-stained cheek and whiskers to the girl behind him. Sakura watched his eyes focus on the floor and could almost see how his mind was turning; every little decision he could make, every word he could speak…he was trying to find the right balance.

"Fine." Naruto, however, was simply caught up in old times, remembering the majority of wrongs that had been done untoward him, he felt like he was seen as nothing but an object among many of his fellow Leaf shinobi, and a monster by some (albeit not as many as previous years) of the civilians. Amongst the three things he had forced himself to assume of Sakura in the couple's past five minutes of arguing, he found a fourth as she threw his rank back at him: She didn't have faith in him and his capabilities to reach his ultimate goal. Even as his teammate, perhaps she thought it was a lost cause…maybe many of his other friends and acquaintances also thought it was but a pipe dream, but humoured him by going along with it. That brought his anger back to the forefront of his mind.

"I'd appreciate it if you left." Naruto grimly spoke to no one in particular, keeping his eyes locked onto the floor.

Sakura's eyes shot open as Naruto turned and slowly paced toward her, still avoiding eye contact. Was Naruto kicking her out over just a few words? No, Naruto would never be so cold. On top of that, their business wasn't completely finished. Sakura stubbornly stood in her spot as Naruto edged closer with every step, yet she suddenly felt a...

She couldn't describe it. It was as if Naruto began to exuberate a different air about him. Although his head was slightly sagging, she didn't fail to note his straight spine and pulled-back shoulders. Why did she suddenly feel half her size? Their few inches of height difference unexpectedly felt like it had been exaggerated ten times over.

"Look…Naruto…" Sakura began shakily, "I didn't mean it like that. I was only saying that…that you've got so far to go before you can-" Sakura's speech was abruptly cut off by a small yelp as she felt the front of her vest crumple. The space of air in front of her was no longer made empty, because Naruto had literally leapt across and grabbed her top with his left hand, the arm attached to it was held horizontal across both of their bodies. The force of Naruto's impact pushed her back into the hallway, but her concentration was more focussed on the blazing eyes in front of her rather than her footing.

"I don't think you heard me…Chuunin Haruno-san." Sakura stopped dead in her tracks at Naruto's bile-like words; shocked that Naruto would refer to her like someone he hadn't known for years. But the damage was done; never in their history together had Naruto referred to his love by her surname, and title at that, in such a manner of contempt.

"I said I was starting with you. So I'm going to tell you once more." Sakura wanted to move, desperately at that, but Naruto's eyes combined with his growl did a good job of freezing her in place, "What you did hurt so much…and I don't think I'll be able to go back to acting stupid for you anymore. I've had it. I'm not going to smile and shrug everything off like before. I can't afford to…not with everything I'm putting on the line to get Sasuke back. Along with that, what you've said to me tonight makes me wonder if you actually care for me at all. It makes me wonder…whether you would care if I died or not."

Sakura's heart strained at Naruto's emotion-ridden and saddening words. How could he think such things of her? Her eyes started to burn as she begged her body not to force new tears upon her; and the lump in her throat, now effectively a tumour, blocked her from saying anything. But before her tears had a chance to fall, Naruto turned them both ninety-degrees, having Sakura's back face the door.

"That's the reason why I can hardly bear to look at your face right now. Because every time I do, I see nothing but a false confession." Sakura heard Naruto choke as he looked down at the floor before slowly releasing his tight grip on her vest. Although the fabric was creased and out of place, the pinkette was far too rattled to do anything about it.

"Just go…" He breathed out, rubbing his left hand over his fringe-covered forehead. Sakura's voice had all but escaped her vocal chords; she was totally reliant upon strained whispers to continue speaking her piece.

"Naruto…" She almost gagged on her own words, "Don't…Don't be like this." She practically begged, "Please…"

"Sakura," Naruto strongly voiced due to his anger at her continued presence. His eyes were still closed, but he had extended a hand slightly forward to request she not move. "The first time was a suggestion. The second time was a recommendation. There won't be a fourth time. I'm not asking you…I'm telling you. Get…out."

In an instant, nothing existed to Sakura; not the walls around her, not the air she breathed, not even the clothes on her body. She felt bare…raw…naked. There was only one thing with her that she could heed any attention to. She simply gazed, shocked into semi-catatonia, at her teammate, the jinchuuriki who had followed her through thick and thin without fail. She knew ever since he had left to find the Raikage, somehow seeing the point Sai had conveyed to her despite his lack of experience in the field of emotions. Naruto loved her. Gone was the silly crush of three years before; in its place came the feeling of passion she instilled in his being. Only now did she understand just why he was trying so hard. He wasn't fighting just for the recognition of the village; he was fighting for her as well.

With the guilt over Naruto and his actions weighing her down, she wished she could help him as an equal, rather than a follower. She did what she did for him, not the other one…not the one that left her. And now…he was pushing her away, letting her know in the most painful way that she was wrong, that she never thought about consequence…that she was a fool. Because of that, she had nearly been killed, and now he was letting it all free for her to witness. How every punch mocked him, every snide remark taunted him…how those three words from her lips cracked him. She told herself that she would risk the loss of their friendship over the incident, but…

Why was it hurting so much more than when…?

Only when she felt her cheeks sodden did she come back to reality. Her chest heaved, her throat became blocked, her diaphragm trembled, her legs shook, her lip quivered…all of which were signs of emotional distress. She would never have imagined that Naruto would do that to her. How could he? How dare he?

She thought he loved her…

Finally, his words hit home. He wanted her gone. She was now the pest, the apparent 'useless one'. She sobbed inside a small cough once…twice…three times. Her mind was raging; she wanted to slap him, pummel him into the wall and scream at him for his ungratefulness. But all that came out…was a whisper.

"You…jerk…"

She saw the small wince across his face for only a fraction of a second before she ran to the door, sparing him no second glance as she jumped out into the cool night air. A single sob rang down the hallway before she vanished from sight, the door slowly closing and clicking against the latch on its own, as if aware of the atmosphere.

Silence. It smothered the entire apartment as the jinchuuriki stood on the spot, almost as if he were no longer conscious. Three seconds later, the silence was overcast by a loud crash, and the subsequent pitter-patter of dried plaster bouncing across the floor. He didn't care about technique, but even without chakra, his fist had impressively reached past his base thumb knuckle as it sat in the wall. He knew that the stinging that cut through his knuckles would subside within minutes, thanks to his curse; but he didn't want to end up peppering his apartment walls with holes to keep the pain going, either. Tired from the emotional roller coaster of the night, he waddled with flat feet to the back of the hallway and to his bedroom.

'I'm sorry.' He thought in a small and fleeting moment of regret, briefly and childishly hoping that his intended target would receive it.

Haruno Residence – Seven Minutes Later

Sakura's bedroom door was slammed with such force that it nearly rattled the entire house, if not the whole street. Her harsh breathing echoed through her room almost in perfect synchronisation with the teardrops that broke apart against the floorboards.

She felt like the worst person alive, she felt like she wanted to tear her own hair out for never realising how much her actions hurt her friend, and how it damaged something whose power was greater than she first thought, she wanted to scream until her throat became sore and her lungs exploded. But, being Sakura, wanting was all she could do; doing in itself was something she had a hard time accomplishing. Knowing this, she flung herself headfirst and face down onto her bed, and let her endless torrent of tears flood into her pillow as it muffled her loud and soul-shattering cries of regret and self-anger.

'I'm so sorry…' she could only think the words her mouth couldn't say. Her shoulders violently convulsed with every cry, breath and sob that her lungs forced out through her tear-drenched lips.

"I…did all that for you." So cracked was her whispered voice that it sounded like a woman fifty years older than her. "You mean more to me…than you think…Naruto." Just saying his name made her cry harder, but it also made her reflect, on just what the blonde meant to her.

And in that position, as she slowly racked her brain for answers, Sakura stayed for the whole night, allowing her tears and sobs of guilt to carry her into tiredness and on towards a dreamland; away from all the pain, sorrow and regret until the morning.

A/N: So here's the rewrite of chapter 1. As you can probably tell, I left the first half generally untouched, simply because I was happy with it already. It's kind of funny, you can see where I started from if you look at the sudden change in structuring and general technique XD

I know it's strange having Naruto go red-eyed and then suddenly go back to blue before anything could happen. Let's just assume that Naruto's will kept the Kyuubi back. On top of that, I wanted to make the argument not as loud as the previous version.

So...Naruto's hurt, Sakura's hurt...and the former has decided to forgo the ignorant mask. Before any of you think Naruto is just going to suddenly become intelligent...YOU'RE WRONG. As you're probably aware, a lot of things hurt Naruto, but he hides behind a stupid smile. For the first part of this story, he becomes more serious, NOT more intelligent. There's a difference between the two: someone can be intelligent but not take things very seriously (i.e. Part 1 Shikamaru); and somebody can also be serious about things, but not have the same sort of high mental capacity (i.e. Naruto during his wind manipulation training). So for this fic, assume the second thing until the story changes and develops.

The rating is T for the moment because I don't really have anything M-Rated going on yet. Expect that to change in the future with language and gore.

As for the NaruIno or NaruHina versions I once mentioned...I'm really not sure anymore. Writing these things takes A LOT of time. I'm thinking of writing a completely new NaruIno one with a closely related premise, but it won't be anywhere near the fluffiness of 'Just Reward' and will also have a less-than-stable Sakura. As for NaruHina...I honestly can't see this pairing happening anymore, both in fics and in canon. Oh well, we'll just have to see, won't we?

Reviews are most welcome in all forms (except anonymous). Praise, flame, criticise constructively...whatever you want, all feedback is appreciated. If you like it, add it to your alert list. If you love the premise, favourite it.

Quick Edit: I felt that something was wrong about this whole thing, and I found it: the paragraphing. I've come back to this page a few times and I always felt like I had a hard time keeping my eyes on the right line. That's been changed a bit now, so most things should hopefully be easier to read and compute.