A life that I will change Book 1-3

"Well, let's try," he shrugged his shoulders. "Do you have a stopwatch with you?"

"Yeah," Naruto proudly showed off the device.

"Then let's count down."

They stood at the line, and he pressed the button and commanded:

"March!"

Sasuke arrived a couple of seconds ahead of him, but he didn't beat Kiba's record either. However, Naruto thought that it was because his friend didn't know the route. No wonder he was the best student in the class. Even better than Kiba. For some reason, Naruto was not upset by Sasuke's victory over himself, he only mentally promised himself that he would catch up with him in order to always be there and keep up.

They decided to practice here. They threw shurikens, held several sparring sessions, during which Sasuke showed him several new grips and ways to get out of them.

"We need to run along the route of the "candy race" again, but one at a time, because when you spot yourself, it's not the same at all." he proposed to Sasuke after stretching and warming up, and then climbed to the very top of the spruce and waved his hand from there.

Naruto took off abruptly. He had never run like this before. It was as if there were wings on his legs. The feeling that he was doing this workout with a friend and that he was waiting for him and, perhaps, rooting for him, gave him strength. He touched the tree and saw Sasuke's smiling face, who turned the timer towards him.

"Three minutes and thirty-five seconds?" Naruto whispered, not trusting his eyes. My heart calmed down and stopped pounding, and all the fatigue instantly disappeared from happiness.

"Here," Sasuke handed him a kunai. "Record your high score."

Naruto cut out his name and time above Kiba's record. The record didn't last long because Sasuke ran in three minutes and thirty-four seconds. But Naruto was not upset by this fact again. He had a strange feeling when he saw their names written next to each other. And he wished that he and Sasuke would always be friends and never be separated, like these inscriptions carved on an old fir tree.

"It's getting dark," Sasuke said. "Maybe we'll have something to eat in honor of our records, and I'll go home?"

"Yes! I saw that a new ramen room was opened not far from the Hokage's Residence! Ichiraku Ramen, there's an old man who looks kind..." Naruto agreed without hesitation.

"Then let's go," Sasuke nodded.

The owner of the Ichiraku, who introduced himself as Teuchi-san, said that he had recently been in Konoha, although he had previously lived in the village and worked in his father's ramen, but had left for several years to study the art of cooking and now opened his shop. His noodles were delicious and relatively inexpensive. Naruto really wanted to treat Sasuke, because he had money left after the purchases that his friend made, but he did not allow it. After hearing their argument, Teuchi-san said that he greatly respects friendship and young Shinobi, and gave a discount. It turned out that Naruto paid for one serving, but they ate two, and Sasuke did not have to pay. Naruto thanked the kind old man for his resourcefulness and said that when he had money, he would always come to him.

They walked slowly through the dark streets of Konoha, talking. Naruto accompanied his friend to his clan's quarter, and they said goodbye until tomorrow.

After a hundred meters, Naruto froze. Something was wrong. A bad feeling settled in the chest area and made his heart beat rapidly. He remembered that when he had seen Sasuke off earlier, it had been light on the streets of the block and there had been a buzz of people. But this time they didn't come so late, and the Uchiha was surprisingly quiet. And the darkness.

Naruto ran back. A clear sense of trouble was pounding in his temples.

Without hesitation, he flew through the open gate and stumbled, tumbling several times on the hard pavement. When he got up, he saw the face of an elderly woman. She was dead, otherwise she wouldn't be lying in the middle of the street in an unnatural position. Looking around, Naruto saw several more bodies. He thought about Sasuke, and everything went cold inside. Where could he have gone?

"Wait, Naruto," a man's voice called out. Turning around, he saw a silhouette with two red eyes.

"Where is Sasuke?!" fear for his friend overcame fear of this creepy creature.

"Don't worry, he's safe," the red-eyed man replied. "I'm his cousin, and I saved those I could from the massacre."

"From the massacre?" Naruto repeated hoarsely.

"Yes, the Third Hokage and the elders ordered the killing of all Uchiha" The deep voice was full of sadness.

"That's not true!" Naruto shouted as the meaning of what was said dawned on him. "The third one couldn't! He's kind! It's some kind of mistake."

"Look around, does this look like a mistake? These people lived, dreamed, they had loved ones whom they loved, but now they are dead. And Sasuke could have died too. All Uchiha were sentenced to liquidation without trial", The red-eyed man uttered bitterly.

"And Sasuke..." Naruto repeated, looking into the eyes of the dead woman under his feet.

"I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to erase your memory of this conversation. And everything about Sasuke. I can't take any chances. We have to hide so that the Third and his men don't find us and finish what they started."

"My memory?" He ran his hand over Naruto's face.

The past two weeks flashed before his eyes. The happiest days of his entire life. And this man wants to take them away? As if they had never happened? It was as if he had never had a real friend. Erase their names side by side. To make him forget Sasuke. The best friend they had a prank with, who bought him groceries, protected him from teachers, and taught him everything?"

"Yes, your memory," The red-eyed man confirmed. "You're unlikely to agree to come with us from your beloved Konoha to share your exile, so I don't see any other way out. Sorry..."

"No! No need!" Naruto raised his hand, shutting out those creepy eyes that could rob him of his brightest memories. "I don't want to break up with Sasuke. I don't want to live in Konoha without my best friend! I'll go with you."

"Are you sure, Naruto? There will be no turning back", The red-eyed man warned him. "I don't want to force you. I only gave you a choice because you're my brother's friend. Think about it, you won't remember anything, which means you won't suffer, miss, or be sad. Your life will be the same."

Naruto shuddered at the prospect.

"I don't want any "old life"," He whispered. "I'm coming."

"Then I have to tell you something else." A heavy sigh came from the shadows. "Don't think that I'm trying to talk you out of it, but I don't want any ambiguities or accusations that I didn't tell you everything or, Kami forbid, used it for my own purposes, and so on. You're old enough to find out the truth about yourself and make an informed decision."

Naruto swallowed, wondering what else his frightening companion was going to tell him....

"In fact, you're already in my illusion, so I can show you what I know. There is still time, and here it stretches the way I want it to...."

* * *

"I am the jinchuuriki of the nine-tailed yokai fox," Naruto whispered, coming out of his memories and focusing on his sleeping friend's face again. The black eyelashes fluttered, and Sasuke opened his eyes."

Part 1. Chapter 10. Dream and reality

Sasuke had a very scary dream. It was as if he had returned home after training and entered the surprisingly deserted territory of the clan. The moon in the sky caused a strange feeling of doom and longing. His heart was beating like a trapped mouse.

"No! I'm a ninja, I'm not afraid of anything!" Sasuke objected to himself in his dream.

He took a few more steps. A vague outline took shape, and he saw his aunt lying on the pavement, turning her empty eyes into the cold black autumn sky.

"Itachi! Mom! Father!" He ran to his house.

His gaze clung to the corpses of clansmen lying here and there, through which his path ran. He recognized many of them. The black shadows seemed to live on their own. They reached out to him, reproached him for something. The smell of blood filled his nostrils, making him suffocate. A sickening stench. Sasuke knew that Shinobi was a profession that involved killing, and he had been trained for it since childhood — to kill or be killed. But he had never seen death so closely or so much. It was as if he had fallen into a terrible illusion from which it was impossible to escape. Finally, he reached the house, which was greeted with ominous silence and darkness.

"Mom? Itachi?! The father?.." In the cold darkness, the voice sounded timid and trembled disgustingly.

His knees were shaking slightly, and every step was difficult, as if Sasuke was walking against the current of a viscous icy river. Pushing aside the shoji, he saw the sprawled bodies of his parents and his older brother next to them.

"Nii-san, what happened?" He wanted to ask, but his tongue seemed to have dried up or stuck to the roof of his mouth.

A moment later, Itachi also fell down next to his parents.

"No! Nii-san!" Sasuke screamed, feeling pain in his eyes and dizziness. It was as if someone with sharingans burning like coals had been woven out of the shadows.

"Go to sleep!" a strangely familiar voice ordered him... Sasuke woke up. Sunlight flooded an unfamiliar room, and next to him, Naruto was sitting on a futon.

"Where are we?" Sasuke wheezed, surprised by his friend's presence.

Naruto shrugged and whispered, nodding somewhere behind his back.

"I left Konoha to be with you and the survivors of the Uchiha clan massacre."

The words didn't reach him in any way, and Sasuke stared blankly into the blue eyes that looked at him with sympathy. The terrible truth took over the body and consciousness, paralyzing, depriving of breath.

"Sasuke!" Naruto shook him. "Sasuke... Your eyes are red...."

"It's a sharingan," he replied to his friend in an indifferently quiet voice. "There are none... My parents and my brother... They are no more."

"Do you know them?" Naruto braked, breaking out of his indifferent stupor.

Sasuke looked around. Yumiko was lying next to him, and his cousin was sobbing softly as she continued to sleep. Kazuki's second cousin was also tossing in his sleep. Sasuke didn't know the older girl, he'd only seen her a couple of times, and it seemed she was homeschooled, or maybe she wasn't a Shinobi at all. Next to her, a little girl of at most two years old was sleeping. And then there were four guys who looked from three to five years old, whom he also saw in the clan, but they were not close relatives, so they did not communicate, and he was never interested in these kids, he preferred to spend time with his brother, Yumiko and Kazuki, and now with Naruto. The memory of his brother made his heart clench again, his eyes stung, and Sasuke exhaled loudly, holding back tears.

The sound of the shutters opening distracted from the grief he was experiencing and forced him to get closer. Just because they were saved does not mean that it was done with good intentions. Of course, you can't compete with Sasuke's level against a strong Shinobi. But it happens that adult Shinobi do not expect fierce resistance from children. In fact, he could have taken the genin exam this year, but Itachi asked him not to. Especially trying to please his father, so that he would say "what was expected of my son." My brother didn't explain why, but...

When Sasuke saw the newcomer, or rather, the newcomers, all thoughts flew out of his head.

"Nii-san!" He flew up to his unharmed brother and hung on his neck. "You're alive!"

It took him a full second to realize that his enemies could trick him by playing on his feelings and replace him with his brother. For example, make a henge or send it into an illusion. He released the slightly blushing Itachi from his embrace and placed a kunai against his stomach, which, in the process of showing brotherly feelings, slipped out of the thigh sheath.

"How can you prove that it's you?"

"And our baby Sasuke is not a miss," said the second one who entered, whom Sasuke did not pay attention to at first, absorbed in the fact that Itachi was alive.

He glanced at his brother's companion, and the kunai fell out of his weakened hands.

"Shisui-nii-san?!" His cry coincided with the cry of the awakened Yumiko, who also ran up to her older brother.

* * *

All the children were woken up, and Shisui printed out the food from the grocery scroll.

"Eat first, and then I'll tell you everything," My cousin ordered it. Sasuke obediently took the onigiri and began to eat, hardly feeling the taste.

He reflected that of the entire Uchiha clan, which had more than two hundred people, eleven remained, nine of them children. There was a fear that his older brothers would abandon him and the rest of the little ones. The situation is very bad. For adult Shinobi, they are a burden. They are located somewhere unclear, perhaps in some clan hideout, but obviously not in Konoha. Naruto also said that he left the village to be with him and the others after the massacre. Who did this? Killed Yumiko's parents, mom, Kazuki's relatives, the rest of the clan? What will happen next? How will they live? Itachi also looks so strangely and looks away, as if he is ashamed of something.... Is he really going to leave? Leave him alone to seek happiness elsewhere. To forget about the clan he disliked so much and "limited his opportunities"? Sasuke remembered these words well.

Everyone ate in silence, an oppressive silence hung over the makeshift table, until the little girl suddenly began to whimper.

"Mina, I want to go to my mom. Ane-san, where is my mom?"

"Shh, Natsumi," her sister hissed at the girl, looking at the others in confusion.

"I'm sorry, onii-sama," the one named Mina addressed Shisui. "Natsumi is only a year and a half old, so she still doesn't understand well... I'm on my own... We fell asleep in Konoha, and woke up here... I don't know what happened...."

"The Uchiha clan is no more," Shisui said. "We are the survivors of last night."

Sasuke looked at the silent children. Yumiko's eyes widened, and, pulling away from her older brother, she looked into Shisui's serious and sad face. Kazuki, who was living with relatives because his entire family had died, including his older sister, who had disappeared on a mission just recently, paled. The others looked at each other and were silent, most likely unable to believe what they were saying. All the guys were future Shinobi who were trained for the military path from an early age, well, except for Natsumi, and they accepted the news quite staunchly. Only the smallest one sniffed.