Chapter Text
The first thing Sasuke thinks when he opens his eyes to the dark outline of his apartment's ceiling is, 'I'm alive'.
The second thought that crosses his mind is, 'it worked'.
His body aches, sore and uncomfortable, but every part of it responds when he tries to move it - toes wiggle, legs move, fingers twitch, wrists turn, arms bend.
His breathing comes easily, the stale air of his closed room still miles better than it had been... back there.
He's not bleeding, his bones are not broken, and his eyesight is not blurry or hyperfocused.
He has both of his arms.
He's alive. He's alive, and well, and he's in the past, and-
His every bone aches when he forces himself in a seated position, but Sasuke's brain has long become used to having to suffer through pains he had no time to stop and focus or worry about.
He pushes past it.
It doesn't matter any way.
It doesn't matter because he made it. He survived, and he made it, and if he did...
Naruto must have made it too. Naruto must be here too. She has to have survived, because if Sasuke finds out he's alone, if he figures out that he made it and she didn't-
She has to have survived. Sasuke would have... he just would have known if she hadn't. Something inside of him - that something that had always responded to Naruto's existence, that link he has hated and trusted so many times before - would have told him. His world would have shifted to accomodate the fact that she was missing, that part of his soul that she had touched would have died with her.
She is alive, and she is here with him.
For ten seconds, Sasuke considers staying where he is. He has no idea of when he landed - they had been more focused on going back and making the damn seal work than they had been on what time they should aim for. He's still in Konoha, but that doesn't say much. Is he on Team 7 yet? Is he still in the Academy? How far away are they from the Chuunin exams? He's in his bedroom in his apartment, and he has no curse mark. This only narrows things down to being between the Chuunin exams and after the Massacre.
The smart thing to do would be to rest. He should rest - maybe even sleep a couple of hours. He should check his pantry, eat something that isn't an old ration bar that tasted of nothing. He should assess himself, figure out if the time travel has broken or hurt anything, what abilities came back with him and what didn't.
He should do a lot of things.
What he shouldn't do is contemplate all this for ten seconds and then disregard it all in order to slide open his bedroom window and jump out of the room.
It's what he does anyway.
He jumps out of his window, and then he's running.
He doesn't care that this is not a sound plan. He doesn't care that it's apparently the middle of the night. He doesn't care whether or not he's supposed to know where Naruto lives or not, at this point in time.
All he cares is that she's out there. All he cares about is that she is here with him, alive and well and real (because he, of all people, would know. If Naruto was hurt, if Naruto hadn't made it, if anything had happened to Naruto, Sasuke would know. Sasuke would be the first to know), and Sasuke has spent half of his ninja career trying to sever their bond, and half of it craving it.
And now? Now, after everything - after Itachi, after the Valley of Death, after Orochimaru, after Itachi again, after Obito, after the war, after Madara, after Kaguya, after 'because you are my friend' - Sasuke can't lose it. Can't lose her.
He can survive the world ending. He can survive his entire clan's destruction. He can survive Konoha being razed to the ground.
He cannot survive losing her.
He refuses to survive losing her.
He survived the war because Naruto needed him.
He survived Kaguya because he couldn't leave Naruto alone.
He's back in the past because Naruto could not live with all the destruction and the pain.
Sasuke would have died beside her - before her - and been okay with it all.
But Naruto kept fighting, wasn't ready to give up - and so Sasuke kept fighting too, because he knows that while he cannot survive losing Naruto, she would not survive losing him.
He would choose death. She would be unable to live.
So, Sasuke runs. He runs as fast as his legs will allow him - and it's almost embarrassing how slow he is, how hard his lungs inflate and deflate to keep up with his rhythm, how much he's already panting and-
He doesn't hesitate when something pulls him to his left - even though it deviates from the path to Naruto's apartment. Because he knows that something, knows that extra sense he's never been able to make sense of, that tug that has always existed between them-
So he blindly follows that tug. He twists left, and runs towards the main streets, and turns left again at the next road, and shifts and-
There.
Blonde hair gleams in the pale moonlight as, from across the street, dark blue eyes fix on him.
Her chest raises and falls with her own exertion, cheeks red from the adrenaline rush. Her hands twitch at her sides.
She's in her pyjamas. Belatedly, Sasuke realises he is too.
For a moment, they stand across one another on opposite sides of the road, staring at each other. The cool wind passes over them, sending shivers down her spine.
She looks... unsure. Uncertain.
They never had time, before.
There hadn't been time, between Kaguya's first arrival and her second. No time to talk things through, to fix the broken pieces between them. And then, after, they were at war, and words had felt unnecessary when they were all fighting to survive against a goddess. They had fought together because the enemy had been the enemy of all, not the enemy of one.
He can read her with ease, now. Can see her wondering what he will do now. Can see her wondering if he'll leave again, if he'll leave her again. Can see her pondering if she will chase him this time too, or if she should give up. If she should allow him to make this decision, if she should close her eyes and let him defect.
"Naruto," he says.
It's just one word. It's just her name, but Naruto has always been able to read him just as well as he has her.
The tension eases, and then he doesn't know how but they are standing in the middle of the streets (who moved first? when?), and her fists are clenched in the fabric of his collar, and her face hidden between his chest and her hair, and his arms are around her, chin resting on top of her head.
Her breaths come in short quick gasps, but she doesn't cry this time. She just holds him, and Sasuke holds her back.
She's here.
He's here.
And that, more than anything else, is enough.
"We have two more days until genin selections," Naruto says, the next morning.
She's sitting at his kitchen table, still in her pyjamas. Out of silent agreement, they had ended up going back to Sasuke's apartment the night before.
It had been instinctual and natural for them to end up laying back in Sasuke's bed, facing one another - it's what they had done during the few times they had found a chance to lay down and rest between Kaguya's attacks.
It had been a little weird having access to a real bed, this time, almost uncomfortable. Still, with Naruto's warmth across him, her steady breathing and steadier heartbeat and the tiredness of his physical body had allowed him to fall asleep until the next morning.
"Hn," he says, frowning slightly as he flips the omelette.
"I had my headband in a drawer next to my bed," Naruto explains. "And I had orientation day circled on my calendar. So we have a couple of days to figure this out. You know," she adds, when Sasuke just blinks at her. "What can I do? What can't I do? My seal is locked tight, so I don't even know if Kurama..." She doesn't finish, but the troubled look on her face says plenty.
Sasuke would say that Kurama was probably fine, but he doesn't know that for sure, and he doesn't want to lie to her.
"Food first," is what he says instead. "Then we figure out what came back with us and what didn't. I know my rinnegan and my speed didn't, for one."
"Mine either," Naruto says, nose twisting. "Speed, I mean. I never had the rinnegan, obviously. Everything else I'll have to check, though I have a feeling my chakra control is probably as bad if not worse than it should be at this point. I tried to use a tree to speed up when I was looking for you, and nearly broken my ankle."
Sasuke would argue that her chakra control has always left a lot to be desired, but he has the sinking feeling that his is on the same level.
He feels oddly unfamiliar in his own body. He keeps doing things with his right arm, forgetting that he does have a left arm now. Again. It's weird - he spent weeks thinking an arm was there when it wasn't, and now he has the feeling he'll be getting used to an arm being present instead. What was the opposite of phantom pains/feeling? That's what he had.
"Sparring later?" Naruto asks, looking hopeful.
"We'll have to look for somewhere more secluded," Sasuke says, then shoots her a look. "No rasengan."
"No chidori," Naruto shoots back. "Or any raiton jutsu. You're not supposed to know about your lightning affinity."
"No seals," Sasuke says, smirking at the annoyance on her face. "You don't even know how to spell fuinjutsu, right now."
"I'm not supposed to know anything," Naruto says, and there's some bitterness on her face. She bites at her lower lip for a few seconds, and Sasuke leaves her to her thoughts as he plates the food for them both.
Once her omurice is in front of her, Naruto sighs and glances up. "We can't tell the Sandaime."
Sasuke had already come to that conclusion, though he's sure it's for drastically different ones than Naruto's. "Agreed."
Naruto glares at him like she knows what he's thinking - she does - and then shakes her head. "Baa-chan and ero-sennin, when they show up. Kakashi-sensei-"
"No," Sasuke says. Naruto look surprised, and Sasuke shakes his head before she can speak. "We know we can trust him. He doesn't know he can trust us. He's a loyal shinobi of the Leaf who spent years avoiding you on the Sandaime's orders even though he disagreed with the man's reasonings and knew better. He'd tell."
"But he's... He's sensei," Naruto protests. It's half hearted at best, though he can tell she is hurt at the thought of having to lie to their future teacher.
But Sasuke won't move from that point. "He's too loyal," he says, and the word might be a curse in his mouth. "Just like Itachi."
There's silence for a moment, and Sasuke chooses to focus on the plate in front of him. He's on his second mouthful when Naruto's fingers wrap around his wrist.
When he looks up, Naruto is giving him that look (the stubborn one, the 'believe me' one, the quietly certain one). "We'll save him, this time. We won't let him die, won't let him get himself killed. I promise."
"You don't need to promise," Sasuke says, pulling his wrist away. Naruto's expression starts to twist, but then Sasuke has fixed the hold, fingers intertwining with hers. He squeezes, and nods at the surprised expression on her face. "I know we will."
Naruto's hope is something beautiful that makes Sasuke feel as if he has accomplished something vitally important. "We?" she asks, hopeful, hesitant, uncertain all at once. "You'll... stay? In Konoha?"
"I'll stay with you," Sasuke corrects. He means it in more ways that he can find the words to say. "For however long you'll have me." And for longer after.
Naruto's smile afterwards is blinding.
For the first time since the curse mark, Sasuke feels whole.