Lean on Me...

Summary: She was found at such a young age, taken in by Shikaku, not as a daughter, but as a wife in training for his youngest son. How will this affect the Nara Clan...more specifically the laid back, easy going, semi-lazy...Shikamaru?

Anime: InuYasha/Naruto

Pairing: Shikamaru/Kagome

Genre: Romance/Comfort/Hurt

Rated: M for Mature

-x-x-x-

Kagome shook her head in annoyance. They had figured out who had taken her...the problem was it was the neighboring village, and if they weren't careful, they might start a war with the village. Looking over the stronghold, she sighed. "So what?" She asked Hayate who was watching from beside her. The two of them had tailed one of the guards from the Daimyo's employment, and to their surprise, they had followed him all the way to the outskirts of the Lord of the Land of Rivers.

"For now...you will report back to Genma...ekhm...I will stay and scout the fortress and report back tonight with what I found out."

Kagome pouted, "I can do it too...you know I can!"

Smiling, he coughed lightly into his hand, patting Kagome with the other as he did, "I know...ekhm...but you are also much quicker on your feet, so sending you to Genma is the smartest choice for us to pursue, ekhm."

Nodding, she stood and jumped backwards before vanishing in the leaved, her new scarf whipping behind her as she ran back towards the home of the Daimyo of the Hidden Valleys Village. From where she and Hayate had run to, it would take her at the least, forty minutes to get to the village...if she ran at a normal pace...but that just wasn't her style. Pushing a bit of her chakra into the soles of her feet, she pressed off quickly through the air and her time of arrival was by half in a matter of seconds.

-x-x-x-

Shikamaru sat outside on his rooftop, looking out at the field, he couldn't stop himself from thinking about Kagome, remembering the last few times they'd hung out with the doe's and their fawn. Looking towards the Bucks, his eyes moved to their antlers and he frowned, he couldn't look at anything without thinking of her. 'I really was ignoring her, damn...' laying back, he crossed his arms back behind his head and stared up at the clouds.

"Shikamaru, get down here and help with the antler powder."

Shikamaru groaned out his annoyance at being interrupted before he could even begin to relax, "yeah, right..."

"Drop that tone, boy...you've been lounging about the house since this morning."

"I was told to go home and pack..." Shikamaru commented as he jumped off the roof, "I packed. Now I'm relaxing before we have to leave tomorrow at noon."

"Being lazy and taking time to relax are two different things, you like to get them both confused with one another." Shikaku gave his son a stern look, watching him make his way over to where he stood.

"Whatever, let's just get this over with..."

-x-x-x-

(With Kagome)

Stopping in front of the room that the group had been assigned to, she could tell where Genma was by his chakra and had been pleased to find him there. Stepping inside, she walked towards him, she noted the papers on the ground with bits and pieces of information scribbled down in some kind of organized chaos. "We found out who was responsible for the kidnapping."

"Who?"

"We followed one of the Daimyo's guards to the village at the outskirts of the Hidden Valleys Village, to the fortress of the Lord of the Land of Rivers...the Shizuka clan."

"Shizuka clan?" Genma frowned, "that name...did the Daimyo mention that name to us?"

"He did," Kagome said informatively, pulling from her pouch a little pocket notebook, she flipped it open and scanned the paper. "I recorded from memory what he spoke of upon our arrival and during the initial meeting. Shizuka is the clan name of the Lord who is to wed the Princess Sayuri of the Hidden Valleys Village." Kagome pocketed the notebook back in the pouch, "It seems the wedding was moving entirely to slow."

"I wouldn't be so sure..." Genma lifted his hand and held out the picture of the two girls, the picture that the Daimyo had given to them upon their arrival. "I took a look into the girl who was taken, and to my humorous surprise...the one who was kidnapped, is none other than...the princess."

"Wait...what!?" Kagome frowned, sitting down across from Genma as she let her eyes wander over the two girls. "How do you figure?"

"Take a good hard look at the lady in waiting that was supposedly kidnapped, notice anything peculiar about her?"

Kagome shook her head, but said nothing as she searched the picture for whatever it was that had caught the attention of Genma. "Not that I know much about princesses and the like..." she sighed, doing one final sweep, she handed the picture back to Genma, "I give...what am I not-! Wait, is that..."

~FLASHBACK~

Kagome walked up to the shoji screen door with her teammates beside her, all three were drenched by the rain, their soaked through as well. She glanced up as the shoji screen slid to the side to reveal a large man with a wide waist line and grim looking face. His eyes were closed, with gray whiskers for a mustache and a braided gray beard that fell past the collar of his shirt. She looked over the heavy silk robes, the layers of which were an assortment of Purple, Greens, Yellows and White. Adorn on his ears were silver earrings and on his fingers were a collection of rings, some plain, some embedded with rare gems, one particular ring was shaped with the clans insignia of two sparrows facing away from one another with an amethyst being carried in the beaks of both on a silver band.

Kagome cringed at the giddiness of his apparel.

"I'm glad you made it without any trouble, please...come inside."

Kagome followed after Genma and Hayate, three coming to an empty room where the Daimyo sat down on a pillow.

"Thank you for coming so quickly,"

~END-FLASHBACK~

"...is that...the Royal Insignia of the Daimyo's family on Akemi's necklace?"

"Note that there isn't one on Sayuri..."

"So the one who was kidnapped was the princess...Princess Akemi?"

"Very good, now...I plan to have a word with the young Lady in Waiting...Sayuri...who is in her chambers right now. My shadow clone has been keeping a close watch on her since I saw her while on my patrol."

"...peeping? Really, Genma? Wow...who would have thought that you were that type..."

Genma flushed brightly before pulling Kagome's head under one of his arms and digging two knuckled into her cranium.

"AHHH~! G-GENMA! NO, IT HURTS~!"

"TAKE IT BACK, BRAT!"

"NO WAY!" She struggled before bringing her hands together. POOF! Where she once was, a pillow appeared in his arms. Suddenly, another walloped him across the back of his head and knocked him forward. "Not in a million years!" She grinned, "Now! Moving onto more important business! We need to speak with this princess...and send word to Hayate to return back to the Daimyo's fortress, we should have him leave a Shadow Clone behind and continue to conduct his scouting like that."

Genma gave a nod and sat back up, tossing the pillow in his arms at her and knocking her off her feet and back into the stack of futons behind her. "Send a clone, meanwhile, you and I will talk to our princess."

"Right!"

-x-x-x-

Me: Here is chapter twenty of the story, so far it's moving along nicely! Let me know what you think of this chapter! Until next time, Ja Nai~!