Title: Prison Break
Author: Killaurey
Word Count: 500
Rating: T
Notes: This is a) a crossover with Tiger & Bunny and b) will likely become a full-sized fic at some point.
Written for Day 7 of the Last Fan Standing Challenge on KakaSaku's Dreamwidth community.
Prompt: First line MUST be: Well, that's different.
"Well, that's different." Ino sets down the newspaper and looks at him.
Shikamaru takes a long sip of his coffee, contemplating her gaze—troubled but not angry—and asks the million dollar question. "What's different?" Then, because he can't resist teasing her, "Blue Rose got a new outfit?"
Ino gives him a dark, dark look. "Funny," she snits, "when you're a fan of Rock Bison."
"That's Chouji," Shikamaru insists, "not me."
"Uh huh." Her gaze is skeptical. He refuses to concede that maybe there's a reason for it to be.
"Okay," Shikamaru says, "what's different then?"
Ino slides the newspaper over to his side of the table and then leans to point her sharp nails at one article. "Read this," she says, tapping it.
Shikamaru lowers his gaze. The headline reads Two Escape From Abbas Prison.
"Sakura's escaped?" he says, as he looks up from the article. "And Kakashi too? How? They were both in power suppressing cells. Abbas Prison was built to handle those with NEXT powers." Like us, he doesn't say. It's the truth though.
Ino, still looking troubled is pacing now. "I don't know," she says. "I'm sure the heroes will catch them—they'll want that all over Hero TV."
He scowls at her, noting the way her hands are clenched against her sides. "All you can say is 'well, that's different' about it? Sakura is-"
"Was."
Shikamaru knows better than to push that particular point. "Was, then—was your best friend."
"Until she and that old man of hers murdered Sasuke! I testified against them in court, Shikamaru. I'd do it again. I hope the Heroes catch them. I'm not friends with murderers."
"No?"
They both freeze.
They haven't heard Sakura's voice in five years but the person who leans in their door, with straggly pink hair and a prison uniform, is definitely Sakura. Shikamaru feels ill. Blue light glows from every line of Sakura's body.
Ino, somewhat predictably, goes straight to rage. "What do you want, Haruno?"
Sakura looks at her. "Your help."
"My help?" Ino says, choking on laugh though for the life of him Shikamaru can't figure out what's so funny—maybe nothing is. "After what you did?"
Shadows cross Sakura's face. "I fucked up," she says quietly. "I don't argue that. Ino, please, more than ever before—I need you."
Ino bares her teeth in a parody of a smile. "I don't help murderers." She makes an ill-advised lunge at Sakura, who catches her neatly and twists her around by the arm.
"I don't want to hurt you," Sakura says, looking at him, perhaps because Ino has proved to be unreasonable. "Please," she says, "Kakashi's dying."
Blue light flares around his outline and Shikamaru's voice is low and dangerous when he answers her. The shadows around his feet thicken. "Let Ino go."
"I can't," Sakura says, looking like she truly regrets it. "I'm sorry. I need her. We need her."
Then she's gone and Ino is gone with her.
Shikamaru swears.
