The Wanderers
Chapter 78 – The Desperation of War
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. If I did, shinobi in war, would fight like SHINOBI IN WAR! Where is the stealth, the trickery, the ninja-ness?
***Previously-On***
The village of Sunagakure has come under siege by the largest Quiraji armies that have been seen in the world. Tens of thousands converged on the village with the intention of killing every man, woman and child in the village. In the first assault, the Quiraji were beaten back by overwhelming firepower from the Sunagakure siege weapons, though they were forced to empty their payloads completely. In the second wave, the Quiraji attacked the walls with large boxes that unloaded troops on the walls. On the eastern wall, the Shioro clan summoned up their boss scorpion summon to hold off the Quiraji onslaught, though the giant animal was ultimately killed on the battlefield. The western wall was breached by a clever use of a rhino to bash through the wall, however with Shikamaru and the shinobi reserves, the Quiraji were thrown out of the village and the hole was sealed up. With those parts of the village under control, Shikamaru rejoined his general compatriots.
***End Summary***
The signal came down the shinobi ranks on the wall that the Quiraji had quit the field for the day, but the Sunagakure shinobi refused to relax until they'd gotten word from their commanders to do so. There was no telling what was or wasn't misinformation.
Since their latest attempt at breaching the village had born little fruit beyond scaring the shinobi into realising the true nature of the threat, the defenders' confidence had shot up, but the bodies of their comrades were still yet to be cleared from the battlefield.
"I'm too old for this crap," said Shikamaru with a groan, rubbing at his shoulder sorely.
At his side, Baki let out a dry laugh and flexed his hands sorely, "Wait until you get to my age. Things don't really change that much, no matter what war you're fighting."
Shikamaru grunted and turned to regard a messenger shinobi that just appeared at their side. As with most of the current Sunagakure shinobi, he had a heavily bleeding wound on his forehead, but ignored it as he handed the lead advisor a piece of paper. Shikamaru read it quickly before rolling his eyes and crushing it up in his hand and shoving it into his pocket.
"Bad news?" asked Baki with a raised eyebrow of concern. They'd been getting messages all throughout the battle and they were rarely to give good information.
The Nara heir shook his head and stared out over the bloody battlefield in front of the village, "Not particularly. Evidently my wife couldn't wait. She never had much patience."
"What does that mean?"
Shikamaru pulled out a new cigar from his jacket, but during the battle it had been crushed and he threw it to the ground in frustration. "It doesn't matter. I can't leave this post at this critical stage."
A general at his side pointed past his face to the retreating Quiraji soldiers, observing that the desert winds that had been concealing the village from outside influences was beginning to part for the first time since the Quiraji had invaded the Land of Wind.
The Sunagakure shinobi kept their complaints to themselves as they saw untold numbers of Quiraji soldiers appearing to receive their retreating brethren. They'd fought themselves almost to their deaths, but the Quiraji looked to already be gearing up for another attack during the night.
It was almost suicidal to attack the shinobi village under the cover of night, since they had the advantages of stealth and speed, but if the day's battle had proved anything, it was that the Quiraji weren't above wasting lives to achieve their goals.
Shikamaru calculated that they'd only faced a third of the enemy forces, but now they were facing them all. His shinobi were bloodied and exhausted. Their numbers had dwindled one at a time during the many pushes made against their village and he wasn't sure how many more they were going to survive. They needed something to happen now; otherwise they were going to fall due to fatigue more than actual skills on the battlefield.
If there is anything you are going to do, you'd better do it now, he thought when thinking about the Kazekage's mission from earlier in the week. We'll die to the last man, woman and child if we have to, but if you don't hurry, there won't be a village left for you to come back to. I'd rather not have that conversation with the ghost of my wife.
"What are your orders, sir?" asked the communications shinobi in front of him.
"We should evacuate the non-combatants while the other sides of the village are clear," said Baki with defeat in his voice. "If they attack us during the night, we won't be able to hold them back. We don't have the manpower at the moment."
"There isn't anywhere for them to go," came another advisor's voice behind him. "They'd just hunt us down. This village is our last line of defence."
Baki glared the advisor down before turning back to Shikamaru, recognising that the young shinobi had been conspicuously quiet during the past few minutes. "What are you thinking, Shikamaru?"
"We've been thinking about this the wrong way," said Shikamaru after a few more moments of silence. He walked forward to one of the Jounin on the wall and tapped him on the shoulder. The shinobi shot him a quick salute before producing a pack of cigarettes and lighting one for the head Sunagakure general. Shikamaru thanked him and turned back to his companions, "We're shinobi. Any prolonged siege is not going to end in our favour just by our nature." He took a long drag before glancing at some of the nearby Sunagakure shinobi that were recovering from the recent battle, "We have to go back to our roots."
"Are you suggesting what I think you are suggesting?"
Shikamaru nodded and turned to the main communications shinobi, "Send work to Sakura at the hospital. Any shinobi that aren't comatose I want to be on the walls within the next two hours."
"Many of them won't survive the night if we're attacked," warned the communications shinobi, but he relayed the message nonetheless.
While that was happening, Shikamaru looked at Baki with a serious expression on his face, "Are you with me? I need to prepare a few things and you're the best wind-user we have."
Baki cracked his neck so loudly that the shinobi around him grimaced in pain, while he grinned with a scary expression, "You're becoming more and more like us every day, Nara." He disappeared quickly to gather their forces, while Shikamaru took a final drag of his cigarette and tossed it off the wall.
"Kibo, if we don't return, you are to marshal the defences and keep the people safe."
The advisor nodded grimly and crossed his arms over his chest, while the Nara heir jumped off towards the main section of the village. There wasn't very long until dark, and he had one person above everyone else to see before beginning his plan.
oOoOoOo
In her drugged-up state, it was difficult to tell how lucid she really was, but the look of joy on his wife's face was enough for Shikamaru to know that she was handling things well.
"You look tired," commented Temari with an exhausted look on her face.
Shikamaru smirked and walked over to take a seat at her bedside. Her water had broken hours before, but she wasn't fully dilated yet and was making a name for herself terrifying the nursing staff. "How's the baby doing?"
"Your child hates me, I'm convinced. One minute it wants to enter the world, another it decides to hang on for another few hours. Kill me now." Temari turned away from him for a moment before pulling back and smacking her husband upside his head with a pillow. He fell off his chair with a cry of surprise, while she laughed for the first time in what felt like forever. "That's for putting me in this situation."
"Please. It's not like I had any choice in the matter," said Shikamaru as he picked himself up from the ground. He muttered, "Troublesome woman," just to make his point, but still looked at the young woman on the bed affectionately even while cradling his head.
"You can't stay, can you?" Temari was a shinobi too, and knew the look that he was giving her and why he was visiting her rather than standing on the wall.
Shikamaru looked into her teal eyes as he took her hand into his, "If I don't go, this place won't be safe for you, or for our child. It's a pain in the ass, but we're out of options. I have to do something very troublesome."
His exhausted wife smiled and patted the top of his hands with her free hand, "Look at you, acting all heroic. It's enough to make a girl fall in love once again."
"Don't go getting soft on me now," said Shikamaru with a smirk. "You're meant to be the strong one in this marriage. I'm relying on you."
"Shika, my legs are in STIRRUPS!" she said with dramatic flailing of her arms. "I'm tired, hungry, thirsty, and being treated like an animal."
"So you're doing fine then," said Shikamaru with a tired chuckle.
"Pretty much," said Temari back with a sigh. "Are you going to be back in time for the baby to come?"
They shared a look that only a married couple could share, before Temari withdrew the question and lay back down on her bed. She smiled at him weakly before waving him away with her hand.
"I'll be back, okay? That's a promise." Shikamaru leaned forward and kissed the top of her sweaty head affectionately before turning to leave the room. "And you know me and promises."
"If you don't, I'll never forgive you." Temari glared at him to accentuate her point before turning back to staring out of her small window that faced the main part of the village.
He didn't turn back to face her, as he didn't want her to see the pained expression on his face. Instead he simply said, "I wouldn't expect you to."
Without saying another word, he left his wife to the process of giving birth and began mentally preparing himself for what he had to do. They'd argued over names and all manner of different things before the Quiraji attacked; or rather Temari argued and Shikamaru compromised. Now he just hoped that his child would have a place to come into the world in.
But first, there were Quiraji to kill.
Under the cover of darkness, three groups of Sunagakure shinobi moved silently across the desert plains of the Land of Wind. The few ANBU that had remained at the village had removed their trademark masks and replaced them with the scarves that each Sunagakure shinobi on the mission wore. They were clothed in the best camouflage the village had and armed to the teeth. There was no way for the Quiraji to see their approach, even as they were preparing themselves to attack the village once again.
Baki led a small group of dedicated Sunagakure wind-users to the rear of the Quiraji army encampment. There were guards and sentries posted all around the vast number of soldiers that were resting before the next day's battle, but using a specialised Sunagakure technique to hide themselves in the desert air, they moved without being noticed.
A pair of female Sunagakure shinobi signalled for the group to stop as they stood upon a small sand hill directly south of the Quiraji army. While several continued to maintain the illusionary technique, Baki motioned for the others to take their places while his hands flew through a technique he hadn't used since the Third Shinobi War. The majority of the shinobi in his group laid their hands on his shoulders and placed their other hands into handseals to begin the process of funnelling chakra into their general.
If the Kazekage was present he would have been able to complete the task on his own without using much chakra at all, but Baki didn't have the advantage of having a monster racoon living inside of him. He had to work with what he had. If the Quiraji had any chakra sensors in their scouting parties they would have likely sensed their presence the moment they'd begun their technique, but at this stage it didn't matter.
With a wicked grin that only war could bring out in him, Baki began to make a swirling motion with his hands at the desert sands between the shinobi group that had accompanied him and the Quiraji army that was their target. The Quiraji soldiers were rearming and recuperating for a new assault, and as such would not be prepared for the type of attack he was now preparing.
"Defeat this, you bastards," he muttered to the wind as the sand began to pick up pace and move in synchronisation with his hand motions. To the untrained eyes, it would have seemed as though the sands were moving in line with the wind and little else, forming into miniature whirlwinds that barely warranted a second glance in the deserts of the Land of Wind.
However, as the small whirlwinds began to collide together and rise in height and ferocity, it would have become obvious that this was no ordinary phenomena.
Baki moved his hands quicker and quicker, while the shinobi behind him pumped more and more chakra into him. Several of them began to falter at the overload, but they were held up by their companions. Now wasn't the time to get soft.
Within moments, the whirlwind had grown in size nearly twice the height of the highest building in Sunagakure. By now, the Quiraji soldiers that had been blissfully unaware of their presence had noticed the roaring winds that now raged in front of them, and the real danger that they were now in.
Sandstorms were not an uncommon occurrence in the Land of Wind; even the Quiraji, foreigners to the land, had learned how to predict and avoid the devastating bursts of nature.
But when this whirlwind turned in place and screamed towards the middle of the Quiraji encampment, they could only watch in horror as their fellow soldiers began to be pulled into the swirling vortex.
As it was a creation of chakra, the vortex could only hold the chakra-immune Quiraji soldiers for a short period of time, but the nature of the whirlwind meant that any soldiers caught inside were hurled high into the air, far more than what could be considered a safe falling distance. Even on the relatively soft desert floor, many did not survive the fall and those that did were not left in fighting condition.
Baki was only able to maintain the huge whirlwind for a short amount of time before Quiraji soldiers at either side of encamped army converged on their location. The attack had only lasted for a few minutes, but over a hundred Quiraji soldiers had been either killed or incapacitated already. Their comrades charged towards the small group of Sunagakure shinobi with fury in their eyes and weapons in hand, but before they could get close to the group, they were already fleeing into the dark depths of the Land of Wind desert.
The diversion had been a success.
oOoOoOo
Boshi stared at her brother for a moment before bursting out in cackling laughter. It had a resounding echo throughout the desert, while the shinobi around her rolled their eyes in exhaustion. She maintained her cackle for as long as she was able until her brother swiped a leg at her and sent her tumbling to the ground.
Another round of cackling commenced, as their mutual siblings rolled around on the ground at the sight. It was just another day in the life of the Jakkaru family. Hundreds of them had shown up for the battle, nearly the entire number of their extended family, though the patriarch hadn't bothered to show his face despite the call. His exact words had been, "until I hear some excellent grovelling, I ain't getting out of my cave."
He wasn't needed though, as the shinobi had clearly seen. They all hated to work with the Jakkaru family, primarily due to their inane sense of humour and obnoxious eating of small animals and children at the worst possible moments, but they also made useful allies. Providing they could be properly directed.
The loud cackling laughter continued as the two siblings continued to wrestle on the ground and snap at each other's necks, until a pair of their brothers wrenched them apart and threw them back into line with the others.
"Gods I hate working with hyenas," said one of the summoners under his breath behind the line of scavengers. "Gives me headaches for days."
"You didn't have to sign the summoning scroll," said his companion further down the line. "It's not like they forced you into it."
"Hyenas! The enemy is before you!" came the leader of the summoners' voice behind them.
One of the hyenas sniggered at the comment and whispered a word to its sister next to it, causing a new round of laughter to burst out in the ranks. They knew their orders and began to leap and bound towards their prey with every intention of causing as much chaos as they wanted, but that didn't mean they couldn't share a laugh or two.
Even with the whirlwind at the other side of the Quiraji drawing their attention away from attacking the village, even the deafest soldiers hadn't been able to put out the noise of the horde of cackling maniac beasts bearing down on them. The sound was everywhere and so high a pitch that it hurt the ears to hear, even by the Sunagakure shinobi that were directing the wind to carry the sound towards the enemy army.
Despite the bizarre army about to hit them, the Quiraji soldiers still formed into ranks and readied their weapons to receive the charge. The cackling hyenas moved much faster than the shinobi directing them, yet when they came into range of the Quiraji soldiers they didn't strike them like a horde of charging rhinos.
Instead, the leapt over shields and dodged spear thrusts to bite through necks and ankles, rolling and tumbling around on the ground with the seemingly insane ability to avoid being struck by the Quiraji weapons. The soldiers shot and stabbed as best they could at the Sunagakure hyenas that appeared as though they were having the times of their lives fighting the enemy of the shinobi, but the small creatures were too fast and too agile to be struck by such slow attacks. Even though they weren't able to kill many of the soldiers that fought against, the hyena attack was highly discouraging to the Quiraji army and many of the soldiers fell back after realising there was no point in fighting by the hyenas' rules of engagement.
oOoOoOo
With the surprise attacks on both sides of the Quiraji encampment and the enemy soldiers in relative disarray despite the Red Warriors and Black Robes doing their best to bring order back into their ranks, it took little effort for a small group of individual shinobi to infiltrate their way into the Quiraji army.
They wore the armour and outfits of the fallen shinobi that had been killed during the day's battle, while each bore a different type of Quiraji weapon at their side. The Quiraji army numbered in the tens of thousands and the specialist troops that were generally the ones to pick up the infiltrators the previous times they'd attempted to do so were spread out thin among the enemy ranks. Each individual shinobi had a specific mission to complete and wasted no time in starting as the enemy soldiers didn't suspect them of subterfuge.
Several of the infiltrators moved quickly through the ranks of the soldiers and planted explosion notes on key supply containers, while others found designated leaders of the Quiraji army and buried their blades into their backs. Every infiltrator knew that it was likely going to be a one-way trip for them, as those who'd assassinated several of the Quiraji leaders that weren't specialist troops were quickly overwhelmed and killed when the soldiers discovered they weren't just betrayers, but were shinobi in disguise.
With the Quiraji army occupied with the shinobi ambush, and many factions within the Quiraji ranks wary of each other after several obvious betrayals, it wasn't too difficult for Shikamaru to slip through the ranks as an unassuming messenger boy that the Quiraji army had been using extensively to run interference across their vast numbers. The enemy soldiers frantically moved around him while he moved silently towards a specific part of the encampment that held his mission target. The Quiraji encampment was suspiciously similar to how shinobi armies would set-up for a short siege, and during his infiltration he was able to get several key pieces of information surrounding the Quiraji invasion of Sunagakure.
The positioning of their battlements and the amount of food and water that they'd brought to the battlefield implied that they expected a swift victory; one that Shikamaru wasn't sure was entirely based on arrogance. The previous day's battle had told him that the Quiraji had little issue using their soldiers' lives to win battles, but also that they possessed a general of equal or greater tactical ingenuity than himself. That made the situation precarious at best and fatal at worst.
Shikamaru didn't like those odds at all, and that was why he was going to do this himself. He couldn't ask anyone else to make the sacrifice.
After almost half an hour of agonisingly slow progress through the Quiraji encampment, Shikamaru finally found the location he suspected his target could be found. While the majority of the enemy encampment was rough tents and sparse living as was appropriate for a campaign in the desert, the tent that stood in front of him was huge and covered in strange regalia that he'd never seen before. It was fancier than anything he'd seen from the enemy before, further reinforcing his suspicion that a new player had turned the battle against the shinobi for the first time in months.
With a long breath to calm his nerves and a final thought for his wife and unborn child, Shikamaru lifted up the main flap and entered the main tent of the enemy army.
The insides were not what he'd been expecting. He'd been expecting maps and instruments of strategy, with possibly sleeping quarters for guards and rows of weapons for quick use.
Instead, there was nothing inside. The entire area that the main tent covered was empty, not even bothering to cover the desert sand floor. Shikamaru wanted to tell himself that he was disappointed, but that wasn't quite true.
Because standing in the middle of the wide empty area was a warrior wearing armour plated in gold, staring at him with a satisfied expression on his face. Unlike on the battlefield, the Quiraji general was without his golden helm and Shikamaru got a good look at his face for the first time. He wore a battle-scarred face that could only be achieved through years of constant battle, and a harsh look in his bronze-gold eyes that told Shikamaru that his suspicions had been accurate.
The general had similar abilities to the Red Warriors he'd faced earlier in the day, and judging by the way he held himself back he was no charging berserker or stoic bodyguard. He was the grand strategist that had very nearly outthought Shikamaru earlier in the day, and his standing in front of him told the young Sunagakure commander that his infiltration had also been predicted.
"You were expecting me," he said quietly, while balling his fists slowly.
The general gave his enemy a grin that sent a shiver down the Nara shinobi's spine before he reached to his back and pulled out one of the long swords that sat there. With an almost casual flick he sent it flying towards his enemy, aiming to pierce him through the chest. Shikamaru pulled up his left hand and manipulated the shadow at his feet that extended out from the flickering torches at the sides of the empty tent and caught the long sword's hilt with a shadow arm before placing it into his right hand.
"You appeared unarmed," he said in a deep voice, one that did nothing to conceal his contempt for the young man that had come to his tent with the express intent on taking his head. "You are foolish to come here alone, boy. There is no grand victory for you shinobi here. Only death."
"I think you'll find we're resourceful enough to resist the likes of you," said Shikamaru as he ignored the strange feeling emanating from the blade he'd been seemingly gifted with. The element of surprise had been lost, and that accounted for much of his plan of attack, but Shikamaru wasn't about to turn and run with his tail between his legs, even though every fibre of his strategic brain was screaming at him that it was a terrible idea to remain such a foe that no doubt outclassed him in almost every manner.
The brain of the Quiraji army was right in front of him, and he couldn't pass up the possibility that he might get in a lucky blow and save a whole bunch of shinobi lives at the same time.
In true Sunagakure fashion, he reached into the pouch that had been stitched into his stolen outfit's cloak and removed a large vial full of a shimmering green liquid. He poured it over the edge of the Quiraji long sword, noting that it was not repelled as the chakra-based poisons they'd tested earlier on Quiraji weaponry had been.
"Are you about ready?" asked the general impatiently, pulling his other long sword from his back. It seemed like an ordinary blade, but Shikamaru could tell by the casual manner he moved it around in the air that a single stroke would be enough for him to lose his head.
Shikamaru glanced at his poisoned blade for a moment before nodding and holding it in front of him, "I guess. Still don't quite get why you're letting me attack you like this, when there are surely dozens of your guards ready to pounce on me outside at any moment."
"Call it a test of shinobi mettle," said the general with a cocky grin before slowly striding towards his shinobi enemy.
Knowing that his chakra would be useless in the area around the golden-armoured general, Shikamaru took a deep breath and charged at the Quiraji leader as fast as he could. With his left hand concealed within his cloak, he threw three kunai precisely at the general's unhelmed face. The Quiraji leader casually batted away the projectiles and watched as his young foe darted from one side to the next before stabbing at his shoulder from a troubling angle. It was a fast movement that came from an unparriable angle and would have pierced through the gap in his shoulder plate through to his chest.
The Quiraji general stepped backwards and let his foe fall in front of him. He brought up his sword to slash through the foolish young man for trying to attack him so, but to his surprise the shinobi brought up a boot to kick his sword hilt away just before his blow fell before spinning back in the air and disappearing into a dark shadow that was out of place compared to the rest of the shadows in the area.
"Clever…" said the general quietly, while his eyes tracked the shadow's movement along the ground. "It's obvious why you shinobi have avoided extinction for so long. You're good at running away." He turned his head to the side of the tent and flicked his right hand towards a shadow on the tent wall, sending a short knife straight at it.
Shikamaru emerged from the shadow and caught the knife by the hilt just before it pierced his eyes and tossed it onto the ground before completely stepping out and landing on the ground, breathing heavily. The general seemed able to sense where he was within the shadows, removing a number of attack vectors that had previously been available to him. He lowered his poisoned sword and dropped it to the ground before placing his hands into a ninjutsu handseal.
The Quiraji general scoffed and placed his sword against his shoulder, "You'd think you shinobi would learn when your tricks are futile."
Shikamaru smirked as his hands slowly went through the necessary handseals before clapping them together. "You'd be surprised what our tricks are able to achieve." He pointed his open palms towards the Quiraji general and felt a surge of chakra up his body and into the crown of his head. "Taiyouken!" (Solar Flare)
His enemy had no defence as a surge of blinding light filled the tent, causing him to swear loudly and cover his injured eyes with his free hand. Shikamaru knew his opponent would only be incapacitated for a few seconds, but that was enough for him to expend every bit of chakra he could. With the surge of light he filled the tent area with his shadow, except for the area nullified by the general, and threw out a wide circle of kunai to the edges of the shadow as they emerged as shadow warriors and took held of the bladed weapons.
At once the clones fell into the general and attempted to stab into the open parts of his armour, while Shikamaru brought out into a run and picked up his dropped sword with the intention of removing his enemy's head from his shoulders in a single stroke. It wasn't a flawless plan, but out of his hundreds of calculations it was the plan that had the greatest chance for success.
The Quiraji general put down his hand covering his eyes and gripped his long sword while his eyes remained shut. In a single second he sped up his movements to the point that he was barely a blur in his enemy's eyes, reaching out to stab and slash at the clones that had surrounded him before shooting forward and grabbing Shikamaru's wrist so strong that he forced the young shinobi to drop the sword to the ground with a cry of pain.
While in the general's grip, Shikamaru tried one last time to stab a hidden kunai into his enemy's face, but the Quiraji general moved his head so that the blade just barely scratched at his cheek, adding to the many scars already present. He smacked his head into the Nara shinobi's face as a punishment, drawing blood from his forehead and causing him to cry out in pain.
"Enough playing around," said the general, kicking away the Sunagakure commander's sword and throwing him towards the entrance of the tent. "I've had my fill."
Shikamaru glanced at the entrance for a moment before turning back to his enemy with a confused expression on his face, "You're letting me go?" Even his tactical mind couldn't understand why he would even consider doing that. Shikamaru was clearly a valuable asset to the village and while it had become clear early-on in the war that holding shinobi hostage never ended well for the Quiraji, he knew he was a high-value target and the general clearly knew that.
"Now is not the time for you to fall, little man," said the general matter-of-factly. "Only when your men can see you die, your body riddled with arrows and my blade dragging across your neck, will I allow you to die." He sheathed his long sword and directed an out-stretched hand at the Sunagakure commander, "Always remember how easily you failed here tonight."
Being a pragmatist, Shikamaru wasn't about to argue with the Quiraji general and fled the tent as quickly as his tired legs would carry him. As he moved through the camp, he noticed that he was ignored by every Quiraji soldier that he passed, even though it was frighteningly obvious that he was a shinobi. It didn't stop them from glaring at him hatefully, but it was clear that they'd been given orders not to touch him until he returned to the village walls.
The ambush on the Quiraji encampment had achieved much of what he had hoped; that much was clear from the state of the encampment. But judging from the expressions on the Sunagakure shinobi's faces as he climbed up the wall and joined his fellow general Baki at the top of the wall, it was clear that few of the ambushing shinobi had made it back home. His fellow general didn't ask about the shadow-user's mission and Shikamaru wasn't about to give any answers.
Being let go made no sense to Shikamaru, but little in this war had. He had to work with the information he was given, and for now it meant taking it as the blessing he had to see it as. The general hadn't underestimated or overestimated him.
He simply didn't care whether Shikamaru was in command of the defences or not.
Something made him very confident that he would win the battle, and that was enough for Shikamaru to be truly concerned.
As if he didn't have enough on his plate already.
oOoOoOo
Upon returning to the village wall, Shikamaru and Baki both ran back to the general outpost as quickly as they could to get an estimation of how much damage had been done to the Quiraji army during their attack. Luckily for them, the Quiraji had focused their efforts inward on their ambush and had held off their attack on the village entirely, giving the shinobi within another night of rest and rehabilitation. Their supplies were still damaged by the group of White Assassins that had been going around the village, but they had enough to feed and arm the thousands of shinobi still on active duty.
Shikamaru skidded to a halt in front of the sitting communications officer that hadn't moved in days, "Give me all the reports you've been given so far."
With his eyes closed, the generals assumed that he was concentrating on his technique, due to the heavy rings around his eyes. After a few moments of silence, Shikamaru leaned forward and waved his hand in front of the seated shinobi before sighing and standing back up. "He's asleep."
"Well wake him the hell up!" said Baki in annoyance, walking over and smacking the back of the communications officer's head painfully. It seemed an overly harsh thing to do, but after fighting as hard as they had during the night few of them had any patience left.
The communications officer jerked awake and blinked several times as he came back into consciousness. He glanced around for a moment before realising the pain in his head and cradled it quickly in his hands, breaking his handseal.
"Give the commander the reports," ordered Baki in a short tone that every shinobi in the village recognised as one where the older general wasn't going to be messed with.
"Ye…yes sir." The young shinobi took a moment to re-centre himself before remembering his job and reaching into his back pocket. He produced a small note that had a single line scribbled on that he handed to Shikamaru with a sheepish expression on his face.
"Anything village-threatening?" asked Baki at the young commander's side.
Shikamaru read the message several times before crushing it in his hand and shoving it into his pocket. "You could say that."
Baki's face dropped at his fellow council member's tone. "Did the Assassins get into the civilians? How many were killed?"
"No, no, nothing like that," said Shikamaru with a dismissive wave of his hand. He stepped towards the outer wall and glanced out at the slow rising light that indicated a new day was approaching.
"Then what is it?"
Shikamaru patted at the jacket pockets on his chest before producing a mostly crushed packet of cigarettes. He lit one quickly and breathed in the smoke with a loud sigh.
"I'm a father," he stated simply.
For a few moments there was a lull of silence, as every shinobi present was exhausted beyond belief. However they still found the energy to congratulate the new father and slap him on the back.
"Are you going to go see your baby?" asked a female general at his side with a wide smile on her face.
Shikamaru turned back to look at the village behind them before taking the cigarette out of his mouth and putting it out on the stone wall. "Yeah…I guess I should."
"Don't worry, we'll hold down the fort until you get back," said another general in support.
Shikamaru gave a few final orders to the communications officer before eying the hospital in the distance. It would take a few minutes to get there with his current chakra level, but Shikamaru thought he might check on a few things in the village before getting there. It wasn't just because as the commander of the shinobi forces he had an obligation to show his face at certain areas to try and raise moral.
But he also needed a bit of time to process the fact that he was now the proud father of a healthy baby girl. It was something he'd been preparing for ever since his wife had told him that she was having his child, but now that it had actually happened, he wasn't sure how he felt.
Also the fact that he hadn't been able to be there when she was born was weighing on his mind. Not because he didn't see the birth of his child. He was worried about the punishment that his wife would enact in the future because of the fact.
He did love her, but she scared the hell out of him.
"This doesn't make any sense."
A Sunagakure shinobi walked up to the Nara heir and handed him a cup of coffee while Kira, a decorated Sunagakure general, sighed loudly at his side. "You've been saying that for hours. It could just be that they are messing with your head."
Shikamaru shot him a look and gestured towards the army squaring off against them, "They've been holding the same position for hours, in the blistering heat, without making a single manoeuvre or indication that they intend to do anything except stand there and glare at us." He ground his teeth to the point that the shinobi around him could almost hear it. "It doesn't make sense!"
"They're probably just showing that they are still strong, while recovering from our attacks in the night."
The head Sunagakure advisor shook his head, "No, that isn't it. They still have the strength to attack us again." He turned to his main communications officer, "No word from the other walls? No sightings? I want some damn information!"
"Not since the last time you asked me," said the shinobi shortly.
"Are you giving me sass? That won't end well for you." Before the officer could talk back to him, the Nara heir put up a hand in apology. He sipped the drink that was handed to him and blanched visibly at the taste, "This is absolutely terrible, we call this coffee?"
"We haven't had coffee beans for weeks," said Baki at his side.
Shikamaru moved the cup in front of the Sunagakure general, "Then what the hell am I drinking?"
"You don't want to know."
The ex-Konoha shinobi grimaced and took another sip, "You're probably right. So what are we going to do about this? If we weren't in a desert, I'd be worried about sappers tunnelling under the walls, but that just can't be the case."
"Why not?" asked one of the Chuunin that had been assigned to guard their forward position.
Shikamaru pointed down to the ground beneath the wall, "Because the village was built on the shifting sands of the desert, that's why. Unless they can reinforce tunnels as they create them, which would take some kind of technology beyond anything we've seen, they won't be getting into the village that way."
Just as he finished his statement, the ground beneath their feet began to shake violently. None of the shinobi reacted to the tremors; earthquakes in the Land of Wind were hardly anything special. The timing was conspicuous, but the Sunagakure shinobi were not concerned. They'd been staring at their Quiraji enemies for hours, waiting for them to make a move.
However, after fifteen minutes of the earth around them continuing to shake rather violently, the Sunagakure shinobi began to suspect that something was wrong.
Shikamaru turned to Baki with a worrying look on his face, "Is there something I should know?"
"I don't have any more information than you do," said the Sunagakure general, while bracing himself on the stone wall. "This has never happened before."
"That means there is something we need to worry about." Shikamaru clasped a hand on his communications officer, "If you can give me anything, I would love you forever. I'll even retract the eight death-threats I've given you in the past two hours."
"It's difficult to maintain the technique with the ground shaking like this," said the shinobi. "You'd think a family of sand worms were tunnelling around and making a mess of the place," he added with a scoff.
Shikamaru glanced over at the Quiraji soldiers that had decided to quit the battlefield once the earthquake started before his mind clicked and he shot back to the officer. "What was that? Say it again."
"I…said it's difficult to…"
"Not that! The other thing. About sand worms."
"You've never heard of sand worms?" asked Kira with a raised eyebrow above his three scars. "How long have you been living in the Land of Wind?"
A look from the young commander was enough for him to shake his head and give an explanation, "They're massive worms that live under the desert, though most think they are legends. Think giant sand eels, but with lots of teeth. They're docile though, it's not like they'd ever come near civilization. They tend to be terrified of people."
It took Shikamaru only a few moments before he put all the pieces together and his heart sank as he turned back to look at the village proper. "This is going to get really bad…"
oOoOoOo
Ami placed the large piece of fruit into her basket and thanked the vendor with a warm smile, "It is good to see you still out here, Baa-sama."
The elderly woman who was in charge of the stall shook her head and placed the coins that she'd been paid into her till. "I've been through many wars, little young. Baa hasn't missed a single day yet."
"What about the curfew?" asked the young girl with concern on her face. While the village was under siege, they'd been given a strict curfew on when they could walk around the village, so as to not get in the way of the shinobi. "Aren't you worried about sanctions?"
The fruit vendor snorted and picked up an apple from her cart that was about to fall onto the ground. They'd been experiencing an oddly long earthquake for the past ten minutes or so, but while they were able the civilians of Sunagakure were trying to go about their daily business. "You should get on home though, dear. I'm sure your parents are worried about you."
The young girl nodded and turned to walk down the sandy alley that led to her house, but was forced to steady herself on a nearby wall as the earthquake suddenly got more intense to the extent that it threatened to knock her off her feet. She glanced back at the fruit vendor to see if Baa was okay, and it was the last thing she ever saw.
The ground around the fruit vendor and extending over to Ami's position near one of the building walls was hurled high into the air. A circle of teeth emerged from underneath the ground that had been thrown and revealed itself as a horrific sand worm that burst up into the air with a terrifying roar. Its dark grey skin seemed to absorb the sun's rays that were beating down on it as it rose taller than the building it had partially destroyed upon emerging from the ground. The young girl that had gotten in its path was killed instantly by the impact, while it fully hurled itself out of the ground and into the plaza that contained a small number of civilians that were still out during the day.
The civilians of Sunagakure that witnessed this began to scream in terror, even as the sand worm slid towards them and began to use its giant maw for something other than burrowing through the tough sand beneath the village.
The civilians behind the creature that hadn't caught its attention breathed out a sigh of relief and went to find some of the shinobi of the village to come and deal with the creature; however it became clear that the creature's appearance wasn't random. When sand worms travelled through the ground the spines on their skin caused the sand to harden so that they could use the tunnel to move around between their nests. In many parts of the desert there were huge spanning tunnel networks that covered nearly the entire desert, just for the giant desert creatures.
This unique ability made them the perfect sappers that the enemy needed. Just after the sand worm began its controlled rampage in the middle of the village, loud clashes of metal could be heard from within the tunnel opening. Before the civilians could come anywhere near any of the Sunagakure shinobi that lined the walls, they were ambushed by a large group of rampaging Quiraji warriors that emerged from the sand worm's tunnel.
From the single tunnel, over a hundred Quiraji soldiers poured into the village and began slaughtering any and all civilians they could find. Once the streets were empty of targets, the Quiraji began to flood the nearby buildings as they sensed the whimpering civilian's minor uses of chakra to try and alert the nearby shinobi to the attack.
The first shinobi that were on the scene were a group of Sunagakure Genin that had been collecting supplies and moving them from one section of the village to another. It was menial work for shinobi, but they had their orders and took their jobs very seriously.
But when the enemy invaded the village through the means of a giant monster, they sensed their time had come and collectively agreed to join the battle and fight the good fight. While the sand worm began to chew its way back into the ground to make a new tunnel underneath the village, a single Black Robe emerged from the tunnel and began looking around the village with a faraway look in his eyes.
The Genin saw their chance and leapt down from their high position to stand in front of the Quiraji specialist soldier, with their kunai in their hands. "The shinobi of Suna are here to stop you, evil devil!" said one of the Genin with his chest puffed out proudly. "We're going to defeat you here and now!"
The other Genin echoed the declaration, while the Black Robe only barely seemed to notice their existence. His blank eyes moved over them dispassionately, even as the Sunagakure Genin began a wild charge towards the seemingly vulnerable opponent.
With a dismissive wave of his hand, the Black Robe sent a cone of white lightning made of spiritual energy that pierced straight through the charging Genin and into the buildings behind them, leaving a heavy set of burn marks as evidence of his attack. The Sunagakure Genin were killed instantly, falling to the ground as smouldering corpses while their murderer watched the oversized creature that had facilitated their invasion disappear completely into the ground once again. The beastmasters had warned the other Quiraji soldiers that their control over the large sentient creatures was tentative at best, but the Black Robe would have preferred the creature continue its warpath for at least a few more minutes. As a distraction it was a poor tool.
Such as it was, he and the other Quiraji soldiers that had come through the tunnel into the village would have to deal with the clusters of Sunagakure shinobi that were converging on their location. Without a word, he recalled the Quiraji soldiers that were slaughtering civilians within their homes and ordered them to form a tight circle of defence around him. The Black Robes were not the military leaders that the Red Warriors had been designed for, but they were devastating weapons if given enough time to build up their strength.
It only took a few minutes to complete his plan. The Sunagakure shinobi had attacked the Quiraji soldiers with a fury that only shinobi could muster against their hated foe, while none had been able to get to the Black Robe to stop him. His guardians fell in droves to the superior numbers of the enemy village shinobi and over ten shinobi moved to attack him with a variety of bladed weapons that no doubt would be able to pierce through any defences he'd be able to quickly muster.
So in true Quiraji fashion, he surrounded himself with spiritual energy in the form of fiery energy and exploded the air around him in a massive pillar of fire that reached high above the village and slammed into both him and the surrounding area. Any Quiraji soldiers that had survived the battle were incinerated instantly with their shinobi foes and over a dozen small buildings that still contained civilians that were trying to hide from the battle.
Within minutes of their arrival, the Quiraji invaders had killed over a hundred shinobi and three times as many civilians in spectacular fashion. The fire pillar burnt so hot that Shikamaru and the other generals that had been trying to race their way to the location were forced to hold back to not get caught in the blast. Once it died down they moved in to see if there were any survivors, but it was immediately clear that it wasn't the case.
The fact that there wasn't a burnt-out husk of a sand worm worried Shikamaru immensely and his fears were realised when the earpiece he had taken from the communications officer once again was full of reports of seismic activity underneath the village. He quickly gave orders for the Sunagakure shinobi that had accompanied them to close up their formations as he leapt up to the nearest roof that gave him the best vantage point.
The Sunagakure commander and lead advisor to the Kazekage watched in horror as over a dozen sand worms hurled themselves into view with spirals of teeth and terrifying roars to boot. Shikamaru was used to seeing horrible things and preparing plans of counter-attack to win battles.
Watching his village being attacked so brazenly, in the face of all the defences he had erected and tried to hold the enemy back with, was enough to damage even Shikamaru's strong spirit. Seeing the commander momentarily dispirited was worrying for the other generals, but the emergence of the hordes of Quiraji soldiers from within the sand worm tunnels was enough to snap them all back to reality.
With precise movements that bordered on perfect synchronisation, the Sunagakure shinobi crashed down upon the invaders like a tidal wave. The powerful ninjutsu users targeted the sand worms before they could damage the buildings they emerged nearby and hurt the civilians that were inevitably inside. The defensive plan for the village hadn't taken into account the ability for the Quiraji to attack from the centre of the village, and as such the civilians were particularly vulnerable to such an attack.
Even as the sand worms were blasted apart by explosive notes and ninjutsu and the Quiraji soldiers were slaughtered from a distance with hails of projectiles, the people of Sunagakure suffered.
The shinobi that had previously defended the walls from outsider attack now converged on the middle of their home to protect it from invaders they couldn't have anticipated. The creatures that had created the problem in the first place were slow and cumbersome; easy prey for the quick and nimble Sunagakure shinobi. However, the Quiraji soldiers had gotten quite proficient at fighting their shinobi enemies and proved themselves to be worthy of the effort it took to take them down.
At the height of the day's battle, over three thousand Sunagakure shinobi engaged with thousands of Quiraji soldiers that rampaged their way throughout the centre of the village. It was not a battle the enemy had any intention of winning, but in the eyes of the generals and the commander that still blamed himself for what had happened; it was clear who the real winner of the day's fighting was.
Shikamaru only hoped that they'd be able to recover from their losses and turn the battle back into their favour. It seemed like every time they gained an advantage over their Quiraji foes, the enemy came back with double the trickery and killed hundreds of shinobi on a whim.
How could he fight against a foe that is so easily able to counter his strategies?
oOoOoOo
The attack on the inside had finally been defeated and the tunnels that had led into the village had all been filled in as quickly as the Sunagakure shinobi could, but the damage had been done. There was no real way to count how many civilians of the refugees had been killed before the shinobi had turned their attention inward to defend their village, but Shikamaru low-balled the estimate at easily a third of the overall population.
If the Quiraji had attacked the walls at the same time as the creatures had led them into the village, it would have fallen. There wasn't a shinobi in the village that didn't know that.
The fact that they had held back was the most confusing part to the Sunagakure commander. The Quiraji had thrown a large number of troops into their surprise attack, but he suspected there had to easily have been another ten thousand that could have attacked the southern wall.
He and the surviving generals gathered on their outpost on the southern wall and began to look for signs of an impending Quiraji attack. For hours they stood and watched the empty desert sands shift in front of them with no sign whatsoever of the enemy. Several of the group hypothesised that they might have decided to leave the village to lick its wounds, but Shikamaru didn't believe that for a second.
He'd come face to face with the enemy general and had seen the determination and ruthlessness in his eyes. This fight wasn't over by any stretch of the imagination.
The morale in the village was at an all-time low, even more so than when their Kazekage had gone missing for so many years and they'd been forced to instate a new one in his stead. At the start of the invasion, they'd had over seven thousand shinobi able to fight the Quiraji attackers. Now, Shikamaru estimated there were less than three thousand, with most of those either being support types from the reserves or injured.
"Sir, I have a report from one of the scouts," said a shinobi that just appeared at his side. She nodded in respect to him and handed him a small piece of paper that held the report. When the Quiraji hadn't attacked in the morning, Shikamaru had sent out every scout that was able to run into the field to gather intelligence on the enemy army. He thanked her and opened up the paper quickly.
"What does it say?" asked Baki, who had just arrived at the outpost after reorganising the reserves.
Shikamaru crushed the note in his hand slowly, "Something that cannot be true." He tapped on the communications officer's shoulder in front of him, "Get me patched in to any of the scouts in the field. I want two different levels of confirmation."
The communications officer nodded and placed a hand to his ear for a few moments before turning back to the young commander, "I have Mako from the Ninth and Kiriko from the Twenty-Fourth."
"Hand me the communicator," ordered Shikamaru quickly, taking the earpiece from him quickly and placing it into his own ear. "This is General Nara. I want confirmation of the numbers you are seeing and the positions. Authorization code: Kankurou's warpaint is actually make-up."
He waited as the two shinobi in the field gave him their reports; his eyes widening as they confirmed what the previous report had indicated. He resisted the urge to sink to his knees as he handed the earpiece back to the communications officer.
"What is it?" repeated Baki, recognising the look of alarm in the younger shinobi's face.
Shikamaru took a deep breath and pulled out a pair of binoculars from his pack before handing them to his fellow general. "Take a look. They should come into view in a few moments."
Just as Shikamaru said, after a minute it became clear that the Quiraji hadn't retreated from the battlefield at all. Legions of Quiraji troops began to make their way towards the secondary wall, armed to the teeth with swords, spears and bows alike. They were directed by multiple groups of Red Warriors and Black Robes, far more than previously encountered in battle.
After a few minutes it became clear that the number of soldiers that the Quiraji had thrown at them over the past few days was barely a fraction of the force that was gathered against them now. From the reports by the scouts that were now retreating back to the village on Shikamaru's orders, the force was over one hundred thousand strong, and that was just the soldiers that they'd been able to count.
From every shinobi's perspective that was on the wall, one thing was clear.
Shikamaru's mind raced with ways to stymie the horde that seemed to have made camp outside the secondary wall, but every solution that he could come up with involved resources that were no longer at his disposal. Even with all his strategies and all his brainpower, Shikamaru couldn't come up with anything that might save them from such numbers.
Even he couldn't fight against inevitability.
The enemy had held their far away position from the first wall and had given no indication that they were in any rush to attack the village again despite the demoralising display of numbers and power.
For the few moments they had in the reprieve, the generals of Sunagakure gathered in the main council building and considered their next move. However, after a few minutes of analysing the information at hand, one thing had become frighteningly apparent.
"We're going to lose the battle, aren't we?"
Shikamaru sighed and put out his cigarette in the glass tray in front of him. "Too many things have gone against us. We were never prepared to defend ourselves against this many enemies. Over one hundred thousand…it's a ridiculous number to even contemplate."
"Nevertheless, we can't just lay down and let our village be overrun," said Kira stubbornly, slamming his fist onto the stone table. "Our families are here; our children! They won't spare them if they break through the wall."
"We'll have to evacuate the non-combatants," said Baki near the head of the meeting. "Something we should have done at the start."
"It wouldn't have made the battle go any better," said Shikamaru quickly. He'd been the one to deny the request to do just that when the Quiraji had first appeared and he stood by his decision even if it had since backfired. "They would have just turned around and killed them first, then come back for us. If anything, now is the only time we'll have to get them somewhere safe."
One of the remaining female generals snorted loudly and threw the war pieces that were on the map in the middle of the table into a pile, "There isn't anywhere that is safe left in the world. Suna was meant to be that, and they didn't seem to break much of a sweat defeating us."
"We bled them. That accounts for something." Baki turned to Shikamaru, "Where do you think our people might be safe?" He knew it was a big ask of the Nara shinobi to resolve the problem, but nobody else was presenting any ideas of merit.
Shikamaru motioned to the female general at his side with his hand, "Ruki is correct, there really isn't anywhere that is truly safe. The Quiraji will hunt them down eventually, but maybe we can delay that for a little while. At least until the Kazekage and the others finish their mission to kill the Quiraji leadership. Maybe then we can recover." He reached across the table and pulled up a map over the one of Suna that had been gathering dust for quite a while. "If they move quickly enough, they should be able to get through the Country of Rain and into the Land of Earth. The mercenary group that is the main power in that region has no love for Quiraji or shinobi alike. It's our best bet for a place that hasn't been touched by the Quiraji just yet. It's not as if we can ask any of the other village's for aid, we'd just be bringing the enemy to their doorstep."
He waited for someone to tell him that the idea was ridiculous, but it was clear that nobody else had any ideas that were much better. With that in mind, Shikamaru began to draw up the details of the plan. "The Genin and some of the more injured Jounin should accompany the civilians out of the rear part of the wall. They'll want to move slowly, but we can't afford that." He nodded to the general to his left, "General Kira, you're to take charge of the refugee process and evacuation. Once you are satisfied that everyone that is going to leave has, you are to protect them with your lives. They are the lifeblood of Sunagakure."
You don't need to tell us that, thought the general to himself. "There will be those you won't want to leave," he said out loud to the young commander.
"That is their choice," said Shikamaru darkly. He hated the idea of leaving innocent people behind, but now wasn't the time to be squeamish. People were going to die, that fact wasn't going to change.
He turned to Baki and pulled the Sunagakure map back out on top of the table, pointing to the southern wall with his finger, "Any defenders that are willing to give the people the time necessary to evacuate should be concentrated here. You and I will command the defences, and do our best to delay the Quiraji as long as we can. If necessary, we can lay traps throughout the village after the civilians have left to discourage them from pursuing them." He knew that he was making a big assumption that the older general would want to stay in the village, but one that he knew was most likely an accurate one.
Baki acknowledged that the young man's plan was the best they had and shared a knowing look with the other generals at the table. He got a round of nods in consensus before turning back to the young Nara commander. "Shikamaru, I can handle the defence of my home. You should leave too."
"That's just nonsense," dismissed the Sunagakure commander with a wave of his hand. "This is my home just as much as it is yours. Hell, I have a wife and now a child here. Sunagakure is my home just as much as Konoha was."
"It's precisely because of those two that you should go," said Kira at his side sharply. "None of us here could forgive ourselves if a baby of Sunagakure were to die before it was able to walk or talk and enjoy life."
"Besides, someone has to go and tell the Kazekage," said General Ruki at his other side. She breathed out slowly and clenched her fists tightly, "Gaara-sama would track us down in the afterlife if he discovered that we'd let his sister and niece die in battle. You're the best one to do so, being his brother-in-law, and they might need you for the battle too."
The other generals nodded in agreement at the frightening prospect, while Baki watched the conversation with silent interest. He recalled a not-so-distant time when Gaara was a name that instilled fear and terror in the people of Sunagakure. Now they spoke about him with such reverence when he wasn't even present, it was a heart-warming thing to see.
He just wished the circumstances were better to have given rise to such respect and admiration.
The elder Sunagakure general waved over two ANBU shinobi that had designated themselves as bodyguards to the generals in their leader's absence and gestured to the Nara commander. "A small group of you should be able to slip through the Quiraji lines into the Land of Fire and make contact with the Kazekage and his team. Particularly with the devastation I'm sure he's left in his wake."
Shikamaru bit at his lip in frustration; this wasn't how he'd thought this would go down. It was practically a mutiny. "I told him to go, Baki. I told him we would keep them safe."
The tattooed Jounin reached forward and clapped him on the shoulder as he used to do with his Genin students before he taught the Kazekage's children that had become the leaders of the village. "This is what we must do. Part of being a Sunagakure shinobi is accepting the path that you are walking on and fighting the battles that you can. So long as one of us remains, the village is not dead. You understand that better than any of us here."
Shikamaru instinctively felt for the mark that he'd had tattooed on his body years ago before slowly dropping his arms and accepting that there was nothing he could do. He didn't have a death wish, or any great urge to lose his life on the wall, but he felt like he was abandoning his people in their direst hour.
"Come, Commander Nara," said one of the ANBU that now stood behind him. "We won't have long to get to the hospital and pick up the Kazekage's sister and niece."
"Temari…and my daughter…" Things were becoming clearer in Shikamaru's head. He concentrated his thoughts on those two things and everything else began to fall into place. He now knew what he had to do.
In a rare moment of comradery, Shikamaru extended a hand towards his fellow council member. Baki took his hand and shook it firmly, admiring the new look of conviction in the young man's eyes.
"Fight well, live well, die well, my friend," said the Sunagakure commander with his chest puffed out.
Baki stared at him for a moment before smirking and releasing the young man's hand, "There can be no doubt. You are a Sunagakure shinobi, through and through."
"A lazy pain-in-the-ass Sunagakure shinobi," added Kira with a boisterous laugh at his side.
Shikamaru took one final look at his fellow generals before nodding and leaving the room without another word.
In Sunagakure, there was no meaning in saying goodbye to one another.
oOoOoOo
As he knew time was short before the Quiraji commenced their final attack on the village and the time to leave the village safely would pass, Shikamaru wasted no time in moving through the shadows with his clan's technique to the hospital. He'd made a career of thinking on his feet, but there wasn't anything he could think of on the way to tell Temari to convince her to come with him. He still hated the idea of leaving the ship before it sank, but he knew that the other generals were right.
Someone had to tell Gaara what had happened, and he wasn't about to let his wife and child die with the village. At his side were two of the few remaining ANBU shinobi that had refused his constant efforts to tell them to be with their families and his requests for their names. They'd caught up with him frighteningly quickly and refused to leave his side as he refused into the madness that was the hospital emergency room.
There had been a steady stream of shinobi coming in for treatment and being sent back on the wall since the invasion had begun, but the past few days had turned it into a screaming tarpit of shinobi that had been grievously wounded in battle and frantic medical shinobi and nurses that were trying to heal those that could still fight given a few moments of medical care.
It took him several minutes just to get to the stairs, even with his ANBU bodyguards shoving people out of the way and demanding they let him through. The word had gone throughout the village that they were to either evacuate with the shinobi that would lead them to another hiding place or stay and fight the Quiraji until their last breath. That order had only caused the chaos in the village to intensify; as even the most strong-willed Sunagakure shinobi knew that even to escape the village was to only delay the inevitable.
Shikamaru bolted up the stairs until he reached the floor that Temari had been moved to, and nearly bowled over a pair of nurses that were trying to move an elderly patient across rooms. He stammered a quick apology and turned to see the room numbers down the corridor. To his surprise, he saw a suspiciously calm Sakura standing near a window with a chart in her hands like nothing was happening.
She slowly turned to look at him and lowered her chart, "Nowhere safe left in the world, is there?"
Shikamaru never thought of himself as knowledgeable in psychology, or of having any real understanding in how people deal with things beyond his immediate control, but one look into the young woman's faded green eyes and Shikamaru understood why she was so calm.
She was a doctor, and all she'd been doing over the past few weeks was keeping people alive so they could die at a more convenient time. Coupled with her inability to fight due to her capture, torture and brainwashing at the hands of the enemy, he barely understood how she was walking around with any hope in her at all. Until he realised the truth.
She didn't have any real hope left in her. She knew she was going to die with the rest of the village.
"I'm here to get Temari and go to the Kazekage to tell him what happened here," he said quickly, hoping she understood that there was no other way for him to act.
The pink haired woman nodded slowly and indicated to the furthest room in the corridor, "We moved her to room 523 because she was making life difficult for the nurses."
Shikamaru walked up to her and gently grabbed her shoulder in a rare moment of understanding between the two of them. He'd barely had much interaction with the head doctor of the village, even when they'd travelled together as survivors of the destruction of Konoha, but at the moment he didn't see her as an ex-Konoha shinobi as he had once been. She was a member of Sunagakure.
"You should come with me, Sakura. I'm going to where Lee is. Your husband."
For a moment he wasn't sure she'd heard him, but a light shone through her green eyes and she gave him a harsh look that he recalled her often sending in Naruto's direction before they'd been separated.
"I'm well aware of where my husband is and what he is doing." She placed a hand to her eyes as if to rub the exhaustion away with her fingers before staring back out at the village that had become utter chaos. "I can't leave these people. I'm a healer and there are people here that need medicine. There's work to be done here yet."
Shikamaru let his arm drop off her shoulder to his side; clearly he'd misread her. She wasn't deciding to stay because she'd lost hope.
"You'll die…you know that." He tried to keep his voice low to avoid panicking any of the hospital staff or patients that might overhear them, but at this stage he suspected everyone in Sunagakure knew what was happening.
Sakura gave him a half-smile that was heartbreaking to see before turning back to the window that overlooked the village. "Maybe that will set things right."
One of the ANBU that had come with him tapped Shikamaru on the shoulder as a reminder that they didn't have time to waste here. The Sunagakure commander waved off his council and told them to go to the room ahead of him, while he gave his old friend one final look.
There was a faraway look in Sakura's eyes now, combined with a relaxed posture and accepting manner. He knew there would be no way for him to be able to talk her out of staying. The only reason he wasn't doing the same was because of Temari and their child, and the knowledge that somebody had to tell Gaara that the village had been lost.
He didn't say goodbye to her, even though Shikamaru knew he'd never see Sakura alive again. Rather, he gave her a slight tap on the arm as his way of telling her that he understood, and moved past her to collect the woman he loved and the little girl they'd just brought into the world.
He was fighting this war for them, and their safety mattered more to him at that moment.
oOoOoOo
The two ANBU shinobi waited in the doorway as Shikamaru explained the situation to his recovering wife, even as she held their newly born daughter in her arms and was listening to him intently. The usually frightening-looking Temari looked like she'd ridden through hell and back just as hard as any shinobi that had fought in the previous few days, but even in her current state Shikamaru had to admit she was an amazing woman.
Once he finished explaining he waited for the inevitable argument that they couldn't abandon the village and they should go with the refugees of the village rather than embark on some mad crusade to tell her younger brother that they'd lost his village in the few days that he hadn't been there to protect it.
But Temari had made it a habit of surprising him over the years, and today she was laying it on one after the other. Pressing their daughter into her chest affectionately, she nodded slowly and swung her legs over the edge of the bed, "Okay."
"I know you don't want to go but I really think…wait…are you agreeing with me?" Shikamaru knew that his wife wasn't as stereotypically tsundere as the others in the village painted her as, but she was usually pretty damn close. He couldn't help himself. "This is a big moment for me."
"Yes, we're all very proud," said the blonde kunoichi with an exhausted smirk. Childbirth had not agreed with her under any capacity, but with her daughter sleeping soundlessly in her arms she wasn't about to be bedridden and allow their enemy to come in and slaughter them.
However, she wasn't as strong as she would have liked, and the moment she began to waver her husband shot forward and grabbed her around the waist to steady her. She held on to her daughter with both of her hands and continued to rock her in the hope that she didn't wake up.
"Motherhood agrees with you," said Shikamaru into her ear with a wide smile. Even despite the death and destruction that was about to come down on the village, and the knowledge that they likely wouldn't make the long journey to the Land of Fire, he could still find some joy in the moment.
Temari laughed softly and kissed him gently on the cheek, "Thanks, Shika. And before you ask, I trust your judgement. If you say this is what we have to do, then we'll do it."
The Nara heir stared blankly at her for a few moments before shaking himself out of his amazement and turning to the ANBU that had accompanied him, "Are you sure you wouldn't rather be with your families? Last chance."
Temari glanced over at her husband with a raised eyebrow. "Shika, this is Hyoji and Mekatora. They don't have families to go to. Didn't you know that?"
"No…no, I didn't." Shikamaru helped her walk over to the doorway. "I'm sorry…" he muttered as they walked past the ANBU shinobi. The pair of Sunagakure shinobi glanced at each other for a moment through their animal masks before nodding to each other and walking out of the room to accompany the couple on their journey.
"You know, we should really come up with a name for our little girl," said Temari as she began to recover her strength down the flights of stairs towards the hospital entrance. "And we aren't calling her Raikou." (Lightning)
"Whatever happened to you agreeing with me?" asked Shikamaru with a sigh. He thought that was a great name for either a boy or a girl. Either that or Kaki. (Fire)
Temari tapped his arm to indicate that she could walk on her own as they came to the end of the stairs and one of the ANBU opened the door for them to walk through. "Yeah, that time is over." She kept her daughter close to her chest and her husband at her side as they walked out of the hospital unmolested by the other residents of the hospital and began to make their way to one of the exits to the rear of the village.
The Quiraji had yet to attack the village en mass as they expected, but it was clear from the battle formations Shikamaru had seen earlier that they had no intention of trying to attack every wall at once anymore. They would strike the front wall with a devastating force that would quickly overwhelm the defenders that had valiantly chosen to remain behind before flooding into the village intending on killing anyone they came across.
He just hoped that enough people would be able to get out in time before that happened. He knew the Sunagakure people were as stubborn as anyone, but the war against the Quiraji was no longer one of large armies clashing on dusty battlefields. It would be a war of attrition and guerrilla warfare.
The moment he told the Kazekage what had happened to the village and had secured Temari and his daughter safety, Shikamaru had every intention of coming back and throwing out the Quiraji invaders that were about to destroy the home he'd come to love.
Preferably with violence and his fellow ex-Konoha shinobi.
Author's Note:
And so, the village of Sunagakure falls. The ending of this chapter was originally going to be much darker, and more ambiguous, but I prefer it this way.
I'm open to any suggestions on names for Shikamaru and Temari's baby girl. Feel free to leave a review with a suggestion or recommendation.
I know Sakura wasn't featured in this battle that much at all, but that is entirely intentional on my part. Remember she is terrified of fighting at the moment because of her time as Iceheart, but that doesn't mean she will be ignored. She was also one that decided to remain in the village. I'm not going to spoil the plans I have, but there will a whole chapter dedicated to her journey in the very near future, the nature of which will become clear eventually. Just…trust me on this.
Please review and tell me what you think. I try to take each review into account, and believe me I read them all. Tell me what can be improved, what you liked, what you didn't, everything. I'm a writer so I'm always open to criticism.