another Chance

#26

"let's go" the blonde ninja said with a closed eye smile and a wide grin looking just like a  big ball of sunshine he is as he looked at the raven haired ninja who just nodded at him and then both of them left the building along with sakura whose presence was somehow ignored by both ninjas.
Karin, suigetsu and jūgo were handed over to yamato for the time being to settle them down....
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When Naruto entered his apartment he announced "I'm home" in a small voice so as not to wake up or disturb Itachi who he assumed must have gone to sleep by now but was surprised when he heard a "welcome home" in response, Naruto slowly looked up and saw Itachi who was sitting on the sofa, a book in his hand as he kept his whole focus on the book he was reading under the light of table lamp, behind him sasuke also froze as he heard his aniki welcoming them back, it had been so long when he had heard his aniki welcoming him home like this, although this was not exactly like how he welcomed him back when they were little, it was cold not as warm as it used to be....but his aniki was still here, breathing, alive....and still hadn't left him alone....sasuke felt relaxed all of a sudden, the relaxing feeling came over him so suddenly that his legs almost gave out and he lost his balance as his tensed muscles relaxed so suddenly, fortunately sakura was also there and she quickly helped to stabilize him "sasuke kun" she called out worriedly....it was then that itachi finally paused, he shifted his focus from the book in his hand to the door where the three young ninjas were, what came to his view was sasuke who was weakly struggling to stay stable and get out of sakura's grip but worried pink haired girl only increased her force to help him at the same time making sure she was not hurting him, Naruto finally took over the task of supporting sasuke who was still rejecting their help, he frowned and gritted his teeth as he grumbled "teme! Can't you Stay still??!! I'm trying to help you here!!!". Itachi looked at the two struggling to help sasuke who seemed to subconsciously reject them, he finally decided to move and offer help. He moved forward to take over sasuke who still struggled to free himself, Itachi was not sure why sasuke was rejecting them but he couldn't bear to see him (sasuke) keep struggling and pushing himself (Itachi) like this so he said in a soothing voice "behave. Let aniki take care of you" perhaps it was the way he said it or maybe sasuke was just too tired, Itachi couldn't tell but sasuke slowly stopped his struggles and fell asleep....
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After sasuke was put on the bed in the guest room and was given a body check by sakura.
After checking him she found that other than a severe lack of proper rest, there were signs of strain due to overdrawing of chakra and many internal injuries, she asked Naruto and Itachi to bring him to the hospital for a proper and more adequate check up before leaving.
Sending out Sakura Itachi sighed as he sat by sasuke's bed looking at his pale complexion and bluish green dark circles under his eyes clear indicators of how his little brother has neglected to take a proper rest when he was out, who knows where doing god knows what, what he knew and had guessed was that whatever he did it had something to do with his (Itachi) disease as he had heard so accidentally when lady Tsunade was talking to sakura, the last time he had visited the hospital a few days ago, at that time she may have just recieved a letter from sasuke and Sakura just happened to ask, he was not sure about this, he was not allowed to use chakra, he couldn't used any ninjutsu, there was not much he could do now so he did not know what had actually happened, why tsunade had talked about that or what they were even talking about, he had no way of knowing or confirming it, tsunade had also stopped talking as she must have sensed his presence or what....all he 'knew' now was just him guessing and speculating based on that very small piece of dialogue he had accidentally heard and he was not sure about it's accuracy. Itachi stopped himself from delving on this thought any deeper. Naruto who was also in the same room looking at sasuke and then at Itachi who at some point had started petting sasuke as he slept while thinking about something very deeply, so lost in thought that he(Naruto) was pretty sure that Itachi hasn't realised that he(Naruto) had returned to the room after seeing sakura off, he looked at his pale looking friend on the bed and equally pale looking Itachi....he felt a little complicated and distressed at the same time....he could still remember how this very same person who is just sitting there harmlessly right now had come to kidnap him or something and had very politely knocked on the door of the room where he was staying with pervy sage a few years back when he was younger....at that time both brothers were like enemies, the older one was like 'foolish brother, still weak, not hateful enough to kill me yet' and the younger was like 'i hate you and I'll kill you'.... Naruto found it funny as he remembered that and compared that to now....he almost wanted to laugh at how absurd it all seemed to him and he felt as if he had missed out something that had brought about this huge change in his friend, the friend who had fought him back then and left the village to 'gain power and avenge his clan', remembering that fight before sasuke just left him behind to follow some kind of perverted snake person obsessed with bringing dead back and human experimentation, Naruto felt like he wanted to beat a certain someone up for a moment, he sighed and thought 'forget it atleast he came back.....let's see how this goes....'