Disclaimer: Just borrowing 'em for a little while... Please put down your flamethrowers and laywers.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Shikamaru sat hunched over in the chair, his face leaning against his folded hands. He was tired of waiting. Tsunade-sama said he was conscious, she said he would be alright, and yet they only allowed his father, Chouza, to enter the room. Ino had gone off to get flowers, but still hadn't returned.
For the first time in his life, Shikamaru was bored with his idleness.
As if on cue, the doors swung open and Chouza, the leader of the Akimichi clan, walked into the waiting room. He turned towards the young Nara and gave him the warm, understanding smile that all Akimichis seemed to inherit.
"He's been asking for you and Ino." His eyes surveyed the area. "Where is she anyway?"
"She went to get flowers." Shikamaru bluntly replied, walking towards the door.
Chouza put a hand on his shoulder to stop him. "He's blind. It's only temporary though, one of the side-effects from the medicine. When he stops needing the medicine, his sight should return. I just thought you should know."
Shikamaru only shrugged, but thanked him anyway and went inside Chouji's room.
The chunnin stiffened slightly when he saw the state of his best friend. The medic-nins had gotten rid of most of the tubes and wires, but he lost so much weight that he was only slightly recognizable. However, Shikamaru was informed that the worst was over. Tsunade-sama had said that when they first found him in the forest, he was practically skin and bones. He was glad that he didn't have to see that.
"I was wondering when you would come by."
Shikamaru turned towards the bed where Chouji was laying and blinked questionably. He sat on the chair by the bedside. "You're blind. Even if you could hear my footsteps, how did you know it was me?"
The young Akimichi shrugged. "I dunno. I just knew for some reason..." he sank deeper into his pillow, asking the one question he had on his mind. "Did we save Sasuke?"
Shikamaru bit his lip, as a harsh reality dawned on him. HE almost killed his best friend, heck, he almost killed the entire team, and now Chouji was asking if they succeeded?
"I suspected as much."
Shikamaru snapped out of his guilty thoughts when Chouji spoke up. "What do you mean?" he replied.
"I know we failed, Shika." Chouji sighed, his murky eyes on the ceiling. "Sure we were able to beat the Sound 5, but we just didn't have enough power to go on afterwards. With destroying our enemies, we almost destroyed ourselves in the process."
Shikamaru was gripping the bed rail so tightly his knuckles were turning white. That battle had changed something about Chouji. He was no longer innocent of bloodshed and had paid a heavy price along with it. He was also right. The shadow-bender grimaced. He was the team leader. He should've known that something like this would happen. He knew it was a possibility, but he didn't really act on it.
Chouji turned his head and seemed to look directly at his best friend. "Quit beating yourself up about this."
Shikamaru raised an eyebrow. "Okay, how the heck are you doing that? I wasn't even shaking."
"I could still feel the tremors from the bed rail." Chouji replied. "I can direct a bit of my chakra to my nerve endings and that makes me more sensitive to movement and vibrations that are around me."
"How'd you learn that?"
"Tsunade-sama taught me last night. I might be blind for a little while after I get out of here. Quite useful, ne?"
"So when I entered the room it was just-"
"Nah. That was sixth sense."
Shikamaru smirked, but soon fell back into the deep pit of guilt, not letting go of the rail. How long would they have to suffer for his mistakes? Kiba and Akamaru had torn ligaments all over their bodies, Naruto was completely battered when he arrived, and even Neji was still unconscious. Everyone was going to be all right, but the fact that at least three of his team members were close to death was very disheartening to his duty as team leader.
Chouji reached out and gave his friend's hand a firm squeeze. "It wasn't your fault." he started, releasing his hand. "It was our decision to stay behind and face off against Sound 5 members so you and Naruto could go on for the sake of Sasuke. I wanted to battle Jiroubou, and you wouldn't have stopped me even if you wanted to. I defeated him, so I have no regrets, and you shouldn't either."
Shikamaru smirked. "I don't care how smart people say I am. Chouji, sometimes you're absolutely brilliant."
Suddenly Ino burst in, a scowl planted on her face. "Shikamaru! You were supposed to wait for me! Why do you always-" She paused when her eyes lay on her incapacitated team-mate.
"Chouji... you're so thin... THAT'S WONDERFUL!!" she shrieked with glee.
Chouji would have face-faulted if he wasn't in a bed.
"Now you look good and will get lots of girls and-"
The young Akimichi groaned. "Yeah, sure that's great and all but I'm kind of NEAR STARVATION HERE!"
Shikamaru sighed and took out a bag of BBQ from his pack.
Chouji's nose immediately picked up the scent. "You brought BBQ? THANK GOD! The food here's murder!"
Ino conked the young Nara on the head. "Shikamaru, you idiot! Are you trying to get him fat again?"
Shikamaru smirked. "That's exactly what I'm doing."
Ino blinked in confusion.
Shikamaru rolled his eyes. "If you paid better attention to your team-mates instead of daydreaming about that jerk Sasuke all the time, you would have known that all members of the Akimichi clan battle by converting their calories into chakra. Therefore it's no calories, no chakra."
Ino sighed and collapsed on the other chair by the bedside. As much as she hid through her bossiness and self-centeredness, she was truly glad that Chouji had pulled through. Something was eating at her, however.
"What do you mean, that jerk Sasuke?" she hissed at Shikamaru, not letting her team-mate talk trash about her dream-boy.
"He is, isn't he?" Shikamaru replied. "Any person with a shred of sanity could see that."
"TAKE THAT BACK!!" Ino screeched, absolutely seething.
Chouji sat up and contentedly consumed his lunch, amidst the arguing between his team-mates. He knew he wouldn't trade this for all the BBQ in the world.
END
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A/N: R and R! (Heads up, I might be starting a multi-chapter story soon. Ouran High School Host Club, or Naruto?)