Disclaimers: Same as before

Author Notes: Things was originally supposed to be a vague one-shot with a situation similar to episode 34 of the anime (don't know when in the manga that was), with perhaps a bit more at stake. The story has since decided that it does not want to be a one shot and well, who am I to say no?

Things That Cannot Be Fought

Lying limp in a hospital bed was something he had done innumerable times before. His head was spinning and the rest of his body felt rather numb, so it was by intuition that he knew where he was. He had a vague memory of events leading up to his current position.

Uchiha Sasuke was not pleased at all to find himself back in Konoha, though he had to admit that it really couldn't have happened any other way. He was trained to be a ninja of the Leaf; he was tied down to this place. The course of his life would always force him back.

As full consciousness returned to him, he tried vainly to make out what the strange buzzing noise he heard was, but sadly, it seemed as though his senses were not yet up to the task. Sasuke's admittedly spotty memory of the last time he had been in his right mind did not include whatever had been so taxing on his facilities. He was quite sure he'd never been in this state before, never dragged down to quite this level of immobility before. His blood was right for the Sharingan; no amount of usage would ever do to him what a day of fighting with it would do to Kakashi. The curse seal, which always a bit of a wild card in that area, had gotten easier to control under Orochimaru. He always suspected it was engineered that way on purpose, but at the same time, never gave a shit.

This buzzing was interesting though, as it varied in pitch and tone. It was almost as though someone, or a number of some ones, was speaking to him from very far away. He couldn't make out the words or recognize the voices, only acknowledge that there was a sound.

Sasuke allowed his eyes, which were only half-opened anyway, to drift shut. It didn't much matter to him what these people were saying. Given his current alliance, there was a very fair chance it concerned him and possibly his fate, but whatever decision they came to was of no consequence. The moment he was able to, he would leave the Hidden Village again. There hadn't been an ANBU yet who could find him if he wished to remain hidden and he sorely doubted there was one who could kill him.

A good portion of that was also probably Orochimaru's doing, but Sasuke was no fool in that area. The Snake Master had a vested interest in the Uchiha Survivor and ANBU disposal was just one of the perks of such.

A new tone had joined the buzzing; higher-pitched and faster. If Sasuke had to guess, he would have supposed another party had entered the conversation and turned it into an argument. They could argue over him as much as they wanted, nothing said would matter in the long run. It was only a matter of time before he was gone.

Abruptly, the buzzing stopped, replaced by a creak and a slam. The voices had come from outside of his room, Sasuke reasoned, but now one of the speakers had entered. He didn't bother opening his eyes. He could hear various scrapings and shufflings as the person wandered around his room. There was a swish as the drapes opened, a muffled crinkle as a bouquet was set on his bedside table and the groan of the bedsprings as the visitor crowded his personal space by sitting on the edge of his bed and placing a damp cloth on his forehead.

That done, the intruder seemed at a loss of what to do next. Aside from the steady beeping of the monitors, the room was silent. The people on the other side of the door had ceased their conversation and the visitor had done everything possible to make the room more cheerful.

He hadn't opened his eyes nor could he sense a familiar chakra, but Sasuke had still been going on the assumption that his guest was Sakura. Undoubtedly, ANBU guarded his door and made a fuss about her going in. Much like there wasn't an ANBU alive that could catch him, Sasuke was skeptical that there was one alive who could stop that girl from taking care of him once she got the idea in her head that he needed to be pampered.

Minutes stretched by, tallied by the continuous beeping of the machinery. He knew full well that not opening his eyes wouldn't make her leave, but at least if she thought he wasn't conscious, she wouldn't try to hug him or talk to him.

Tears were another matter entirely, (Sasuke brushed that he hadn't seen that coming off as being concussed), so when she began to cry, he forced his eyelids to flutter open. Sure enough, it was the pink-haired kunoichi who sat next to him, her face in her palms and shoulders shaking as she sobbed. Layers of white gauze and medical tape were wrapped around her upper left arm in a thick bandage.

Sasuke remembered that cut. It was a fairly deep gash that bled profusely.

And led to a slaughter.

Funny how he didn't regret killing any of those Sound Ninja.

His throat wasn't in much better shape than the rest of him, it seemed. "Sa..ku..ra.." came out very hoarse, but it was enough to stop her sobbing, jump from his side and whirl around to face him.

"Sasuke-kun!" She wiped furiously at her eyes but it did little good as another sort of tear starting trailing down her cheeks. These were silent, relieved tears, joy that he was awake and possibly out of the woods. The curse-seal wasn't going to kill him. Sasuke's fate was in his own hands again. "What happened? Why did you kill those Sound Ninja? Are you going to leave Orochimaru?" Sakura batted at her eyes again. "Oh, no," She finally calmed down in her joy enough that his condition sank in, "you shouldn't try to speak yet."

Sakura sat next to him on the bed again, and laid her hand on the washcloth, testing its temperature and moistness. She sighed. "There are two ANBU outside your door and two more hiding somewhere outside the window. You'll have to do a lot of healing before you could get past any of them, so don't leave." Her head drooped. "They have orders to kill you if you try." More eye-wiping. "We probably shouldn't have brought you back here after you passed out, but we just didn't know what else to do. Kakashi-sensei said that the Hunters won't kill a missing nin who returns of his own free will, so don't tell anyone we brought you back." Sakura's shoulders began shaking again. "So please, just stay!"

Sasuke tried to speak, coughed, and began again. "You know I can't do that."

"You'll never get revenge if you get yourself killed first."

Fighting back against that particular low blow was beyond him at the moment; speech was difficult. The only time he had any sort of difficulty with his training or his fighting, with regards to health was in the presence of this original teammates. The three-and Kakashi-had started bonding the day they passed Kakashi's test. Kakashi celebrated teamwork and Haku introduced the concept of precious persons to them, but it boiled down to that he cared about them immensely. Letting any misfortune fall upon them, except at the hands of himself it seemed, would be like the Uchiha Massacre happening all over again. In Konohakagure, protecting them came first. Away from them, he could put his family first and embrace avenging the dead. If Naruto, Kakashi and Sakura couldn't just forget about him, the least they could do was have a bit of faith. Nothing had killed him yet, a little over-exertion wouldn't do him in.

"Go away."

Sakura shook her head at the demand. "Not yet," she replied. "Naruto's supposed to meet me here. Jiraiya-sama is having a meeting with Tsunade-sama. Naruto can get information from Jiraiya-sama pretty easily, or so he says. Once we know what she plans to do with you, we can decide what we're going to do." Sakura flashed a triumphant grin, the kind that let her teammates know she was the brains in their little social circle. Sasuke smirked in return at her challenge. So they were a few steps ahead; in the long run, it wouldn't matter.

A fully clad but all the same very cute pig-tailed blonde clapped onto Jiraiya the moment heavy wooden doors slammed behind him. "Toad Master," she pouted, "what did the old woman saaaay?" This could very well be a cuteness overload, the blonde decided, completely ignoring the fact that one had ever seen Jiraiya come across a girl that was enough to give him the sort of reaction Iruka or Ebisu suffered from the Sexy no Jutsu. A puff of smoke later there was a twelve-year-old boy glaring up at the old master. "Well?"

Sadly, Naruto's true form never held the old man's attention like his favorite trick did and he could swear he was being ignored on purpose.

"Hey!"

Jiraiya relinquished enough of his attention to face his ever-demanding protégé. "Don't speak so crass as a woman, boy." Naruto groaned. "Girls speak cutely," he added an unconvincing falsetto, "like this." Like so many conversations with Jiraiya, Naruto found this one to be going swiftly downhill.

"So what did the old woman say about Sasuke?"

With a sigh, Jiraiya began walking down the cobbled road, leaving the meeting place of official business behind. Naruto watched for a moment his mentor for a moment, glanced behind him at the building—he thought he sensed something—and took off at a jog to catch up. Once side by side, he slowed his pace to match the other's.

"Hey, Pervert!"

"A trial," Jiraiya replied. "Once he's well enough to speak on his own behalf, he'll be tried and punished accordingly."

Naruto grinned. "That's good, right? Sasuke can explain…" His own words and Jiraiya's expression sobered him. The idea that Sasuke could present a good argument seemed rather unlikely. The idea that he would express remorse was even more far fetched. Curse seal or not, Sasuke had made his own decision based on his own goals.

"Until then," Jiraiya continued, "a full team of ANBU will be guarding him at all times."

"Don't the assassins have anything better to do?" Naruto demanded. "We're at war! Sasuke can't even move and she's setting ANBU on him?"

"It's not Sasuke that's the problem, not yet anyway. It's that Orochimaru wants him." Jiraiya crouched on his haunches. "Tsunade and I were Orochimaru's teammates. We knew him better than anyone but the Third and even he was too idealistic. He thought Orochimaru would return someday. You, Kakashi and that girl of yours can't make the same mistake if the Uchiha boy follows Orochimaru's path.

"Tsunade's smart enough to be prepared for the Sound Nin coming after him. Orochimaru sets his plans in motion, he's not going to wait for us to make any moves. The Uchiha's important to him. If we could, we'd have more ANBU guarding him, but there are just too many jobs we need to have high ranking shinobi doing. We can't afford anymore."

Naruto frowned and screwed his eyes up in typical fox fashion. "But if its that important, then why not?"

"That old woman just has enough faith in you, boy. Take care of your friend."

Naruto lit up at his teacher's praise—and the Hokage's—and ran off to tell his teammates, what he had learned. He was a good distance away when the Hokage herself stepped out of whatever illusory shadow she had been hiding in to step beside Jiraiya. "You indulge him too much," she said fondly.

"I think he would say the opposite. He never seems to realize he's got my attention."

Tsunade laughed. "Well maybe if you acted like it…"

Jiraiya's eyes traced the distance Naruto had disappeared into. "When I met him, he reminded me of myself, but the more I know him, its like watching his father grow up all over again."

Next—The Trial and the Posing of a Question