To Kimmie: Ur right in that the explanations thing was really stupid. I was just very irritated that someone didn't get what I thought was very obvious. (obviously i get bothered way too easily) I planned to only keep that up temporarily for her benefit anyways so it's already (obviously) taken down. I think the reason I immediately posted a response was cuz I was already annoyed from these really long annoying reviews I got for my other fic but I'm waiting to put my response on the next chapter (which I haven't felt like finishing). I would have emailed this girl personally but I don't like the idea of giving strangers my email address.

Naruto doesn't belong to me cuz if it did I'd be rich. Don't sue me cuz all you'll get is some lint and an overweight cat.

Oh yea, OOC means out of character right? (unless I'm horribly wrong). I don't feel this is an OOC fic. If something like this was to happen in the lives of Shikamaru and Ino, I feel this would be their reaction.

Ch.2 Aftermath: Tying Up Loose Ends

Shikamaru slipped into his house, no, his parent's house, through the window of his room because drunk guests from the night before still slept on the first floor. His residence was at the far side of town where affordable apartment buildings housed young ninjas like him who were living on their own for the first time.

He quietly slid his window shut and turned around. The polished bronze key on his desk laid there like an abandoned dream.

For his twenty-first birthday, his parents had found him an apartment. Not stopping at that, they even paid the first three months of rent. It was their way of saying that they trusted him, that he was now a man who deserved to have full freedom in the way he wished to live his life. The Nara clan wasn't a rich bunch but they took care for their own, which was of course friends, family, and all of Konoha like any loyal ninja. Therefore, this present from his parents was considered pretty lavish since it put a real strain on their budget. It was a gesture that even an unresponsive guy like him had trouble not getting excited over.

He had dreamed about the new life he thought he was going to have. Shikamaru thought that living on his own meant he could sleep all day without reproach, getting up only to go on missions he was obligated to have. Other than the few blemishes in his plan for an easygoing life, which were the missions he had to take part in, he thought he was going to spend his existence laying on his balcony, gazing at the clouds that went by. That kind of life was impossible now. He no longer had the right to loiter in the background while complaining about events that pertain to someone else was troublesome. After all, he was the one caught up in the center of one of the most horrible event ever to happen during peacetime.

What would his parents say when they find out what he did to their best friends' daughter?

Shikamaru dragged his feet to the bathroom, the heaviness of his soul weighed down his steps. He could still see the ghastly scene in his mind's eye. It was tormenting him with its clarity. Every little detail was precise without variation: her bloodstained inner thighs.....the blood from the same source on his lap. How he hated his photographic memory. If only there was some way to claw this image from his consciousness. If only his mind would stop playing scenes from each of the possible ways he might have attacked her.

A new scenario of what might have taken place was currently unfolding in his mind like a morbid movie. He moved in on the unsuspecting girl like a practiced predator. His hands grabbed her from behind but she didn't know to be afraid. Instead, she turned and smiled trustingly. Her blue eyes were like deep pools of water but he never noticed. He was after something else of her's. Then, boring good 'ol Shikamaru, the Mr. Good guy, finally revealed his true nature. He moved in for the kill, easily overpowering the intoxicated girl. He had a fist-full of her hair and when he forced her onto the ground, he feasted his free hand on her breasts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

"NO!!"

A low tortured moan fought its way out of his lungs. "Please stop.." He covered his face with his hands, fruitlessly trying to block out the bombarding images. "No more....I don't want to see myself hurting her anymore..." He stood there with trembling shoulders and his face buried in his hands. No matter how hard he tried . . . . he slowly took his hands away from his face. . . . . the visuals just won't stop. And it was just the beginning of his punishment.

With an angry yank, he opened the mirror door of the medicine cabinet and took out a bottle of hydrogen peroxide. The injuries on his arms needed tending to before they started getting infected. The blood had stopped flowing hours ago but it was horrible to look at. The bleeding from the wide cuts had coagulated unevenly, giving the developing scabs a reptilian look. The angry red gashes contrasted sharply with his pale skin. It looked like he had some sort of contagious flesh-eating disease. But the people of the village had nothing to fear. He's one hundred percent disease free, unless of course, becoming a rapist was contagious.

While, inspecting himself, Shikamaru wondered why there were no injuries more severe than a few bites and scratches. She certainly could have done a lot more damage if she wished. Ino was a competent ninja with more energy and fight in her than any woman he knows. So why didn't she take a kunai to him when he attacked her?

He twisted open the cap of the hydrogen peroxide and stuck his left arm into the bathroom sink.

He knew the answer in his heart but didn't want to face the heart wrenching truth. It was because Ino took it easy on him. Despite of what he was doing to her, she didn't want to hurt him.

Without any hesitation, he poured the hydrogen peroxide up and down the arm until the antiseptic had washed over every part of his skin. The bubbling reaction immediately took place, sizzling to show its antibiotic effect and covering his fingernail-inflicted marks with white foam. Even the burning from the stinging pain all over his arm couldn't distract him from angst that had consumed his very being.

He switched arms to repeat the procedure. Impassive eyes watched the clear liquid stream out and splash over his arms, the water-like liquid turning into milky froth on contact with the unclean lesions. There was a twinge of masochist pride in him over the painfulness of the cleaning procedure. If he was going to start atoning for his atrocious wrong, he needed every bit of physical pain to count. Maybe that way, the pain he felt in his very essence can be drowned out.
"So dirty...so dirty...so dirty..."

Shikamaru's smell was all over her--both inside and out. The scent that used to be comforting was now a stench that made her sick to her stomach. Why wasn't the smell going away? She's been washing for so long but she can still smell him easily.

"So dirty..." she chanted her mantra and scrubbed her skin even harder under the scalding hot water of the shower. 'Maybe,' she thought, 'If I washed enough, I'll be clean again.' If the water was hot enough, her stain might get burned away. If she scrubbed hard enough, she might be able to purify her dirtied self.

Her body was in so much pain--all sorts of strange and foreign aching and throbbing from things she had no experience with. Sure she used to talk big but the truth was, the only guy she's ever been even mildly physically intimate with was Shikamaru. And that was because around the age of fourteen, she bossed him into trying out kissing. It was the first time for the both of them. Now they shared another first time. Sex.

'I didn't want to!' She mentally cried out. Did Shikamaru think she was that type of girl because of the way she acted? He was a pretty traditional guy. Maybe he thought she slept with anyone because of the skimpy clothes she sometimes wore. Did he look down on her? If he didn't before he must now. He must have thought that it wasn't a big deal for a girl like her to sleep with him seeing how they've known each other all their lives. Maybe she had sent him the wrong signals. How did she act last night....she couldn't remember because she was drunk. Maybe she made the moves on him and he only followed through.

She clutched her shower scrub to her chest and sat down carefully in the tub because it hurt to stand. The boiling water rain down from above, scalding her head and streaming down her back. Her skin was scarlet from the hot water and raw from too much scrubbing. She must have removed a layer of skin with her passionate cleaning. But she knew she was still dirty.

Fearfully, she slipped a hand down between her legs where the most intense of the pains were located. Her hands and legs were shaky, a physical manifestation of what she felt inside. Gingerly, she washed the bruised intimate area with unsteady hands. With each stroke, the tender area sent signals of severe discomfort up her nerves in protest. Ino shut her eyes tightly at the pain but a tear still managed to squeeze out from her lashes. When she removed her hand, it came away with something cool and slightly gel-like. She let the water carry it away before looking at it because she was afraid of what she might see. Now she needed to scrub her hands to erase all memories of that sensation. She had no experience with men but she had a vague idea of how they functioned. If there was any part of Shikamaru left in her, she would wash it out.

The water was dyed slightly pink as it pooled at one end of the tub and disappeared down the drain in a mini-whirlpool.

Shikamaru had one arm braced against the bathroom wall while the water from the shower ran down his chest.

"I'm so sorry....I'm so sorry....I'm so sorry..." He repeated to himself. There was no energy left in his body and his arm was barely doing the job of holding him up.

His eyes stared down lifelessly at the swirls of pink in the water as it drained from the tub. The blood that wasn't spilled from his veins.

&&&&&

Funny how she never noticed how much of a presence Shikamaru had in her room until she tried to clear it of anything that reminded her of him. Her trash bag was filled with assorted item of stuffed animals, pictures, presents from past birthdays and holidays and so forth. She couldn't look anywhere without being reminded of him, which only served to make his betrayal of her trust all the more devastating. There was the trophy she stole from him from that one time his mother forced his participation in a math club event. She had to break that trophy into pieces to fit it into the trashcan. Then, there were the miscellaneous items from her secrete collection of things with sentimental value, such as the ticket tab from the first time Asuma took the team to a carnival, or, a dried flower from a birthday bouquet Shikamaru had scrounged up at the last minute just to avoid her scolding.

The pressure in her sinus intensified as she caught the salty smell of tears threatening to spill. She was so sick of crying, of being weak and disgustingly womanly, but she couldn't bring herself to stop. It was like she was broken. Like she was some doll stuck on the crying function.

Ino dropped the trash bag she was carrying in her hand and crawled in bed. Exhaustion had taken over. Taking out the trash can wait until later, she decided. She rolled over to lay on her back and stare at the ceiling. The tears leaked from the corner of her eyes and slid down the sides of her face down to the pillow that eagerly absorbed the moisture.

Once upon a time, she was curious about being with a man like most inexperienced girls were. Whenever she and her girlfriends talked about the guy they'd like to have their first time with, she always said Sasuke even though the guy she thought about at night was Shikamaru. She always imagined that he would be shy and gentle. The type of guy who would make a girl feel safe because he would let the girl call the shots.

Ino rolled again and curled up on her side, shuddering at a chill only she could feel.

What she imagined was radically different from what happened. It was so disgusting, painful, and humiliating. And it happened out in the streets like she was worth nothing. A tear crept across the bridge of her nose at the nightmarish memory that killed her interest in men.

His hands had gripped her strongly when he got on top of her. Ino recalled this memory while staring at the purplish green bruises on her wrists. There was no warning whatsoever before his attack. She didn't know what he was up to but she was too frightened to move at a first. It was because when he leaned forward to pant his hot breath on her, she looked into his eyes and was terrified by what she saw within them. There was no trace of Shikamaru to be seen. It was like his soul had been swapped with the entity of the devil who had taken over. Within his dark orbs, she saw a hellish inferno that engulfed generations and generations of war and human turmoil. It was the eyes of something too old to be human and too sinister to be divine. She felt those eyes could see through anything with more lucidity than the best of any Byakugan or Sharingan.

The rest of the details were too foggy to be evoked as individual memories. She faintly remembered the rustling of clothes then the intense pain of being torn apart by something thick and hard. After that, she must have passed out. Ino was ashamed that she was glad she couldn't remember too much. She was such a coward.

Years of friendship and his lazy persona all must have been a façade. How was she to know that within the lazy Nara man lurked a sadistic demon?

Blurry eyes closed sleepily while she entertained her mind with a morose daydream. She pretended that she was dying, her breathing slowed with a purpose. Ino imagined that her soul was floating away, casting off this damaged fleshy shell for a new body, one that hadn't been violated. Then, she remembered her special jutsu and curved her lips slightly at the irony. Anyways, Shintenshin no jutsu isn't permanent.

'Maybe I should just commit suicide and get it over with.' She thought. Her heart pounded louder from either fear or eagerness.

Anything was better than living out the rest of her life in a body she hates while struggling to keep her dark secrete a secrete. She was afraid that people would be able to tell what happened to her just by looking at her. Maybe because it happened to her once, men would consider her fair game from now on. If people found out she was damaged goods, she would never be able to face anyone ever again. No man would want to marry a woman whose body was taken by force by another man. And if anyone ever found out, her career as a ninja would also be over. Who would hire a ninja who couldn't protect her own body, the most basic of requirements? If she died, her soul, the only part of her that was still untouched, would be free. She could cast off this abused cage and be the free spirit she always knew she was supposed to be.

Ino was halfway into her dreams when a tapping woke her up. Frightened blue eyes scanned her room. 'Oh my god...' Her mind screamed in panic. 'He's here to finish me off!' Ino curled up under her comforters, irrationally believing that the sheets of cotton would shield her from her attacker.

&&&&&&

Shikamaru stood anxiously beneath the second floor window of Ino's room. "Come on...why isn't she coming to the window?" He muttered and tossed a few more pebbles at the glass.

After waiting fifteen more minutes, he knew she wasn't ever going to acknowledge his presence, so against his better judgment, he decided to break in. Summoning the right amount chakra to the soles of his feet, he easily jumped onto the roof of house with the nimbleness of a practiced Jounin.

"Ino, please don't be scared!" He called out to the girl inside. "I'm here to talk. I swear!"

He prayed to whatever gods that hasn't abandoned him yet to make his meeting with Ino a success. Shikamaru leaned forward from the roof then placed both feet to the side of the house, using chakra expertly to keep him glued in a location that defied gravity. From his upside-down crouched position on the side of the house, he grabbed the edges of the window. With a grunt, the locks inside Ino's room popped under the pressure and the window swung open to allow his entry. His hands held onto the top of the window when he swung himself into her room like a gymnast.

"GO AWAY!!" Her terrified voice tore at his heart.

"Ino...I..." He stepped forward. "I'm so sorry!" He looked around the room before finally finding her huddled in her bed like a frightened child. Guilt stirred in him with renewed vigor. It was starting to eat him inside out again.

From among her covers, Ino fearful wide eyes were watery blue. The liquid within her eyes shimmered before falling like crystal raindrops. She was looking at him like he was some horrendous creature who crawled out of the pages of a scary story. That was his new status now. Every woman's boogieman.

Shikamaru dropped to his knees, his own tears threatening to spill while he struggled for enough composure to tell her what he came to say. The night before, he had thought today would be the day he confess his feelings for her. Never in his wildest phantasm had he suspected he would ever have to apologize for the rape of anyone.

"I'm....so.....very...very sorry..." His voice shook with emotion. "I know my apology doesn't mean anything but I still had to say it. I never wanted to hurt you, I swear! Please believe me! I don't know what happened...or what came over me. I can't remember anything....I'm so sorry..." He swallowed a loud sob. "I'm so sorry...." He knelt before her, hoping that she would at least listen him before killing him or throwing him out. Shikamaru kept his head bowed in shame while his ears strained for a response from Ino, any response. But none came, except for the barely detectable soft sniffling that came periodically from her hiding spot in bed.

Shikamaru placed his open palms on the floor and kowtowed until his forehead was also touching the floor. "I know there's no restitution that can heal the scars that will be in your heart long after your physical wound close......and I don't have much money.....but you're welcome to take everything I own....and.......and.....Ino, will killing me give you any satisfaction? My life is yours." He waited patiently for her to make up her mind. More tears splashed onto the floor from his eyes.

"I don't want your life." She said in a delicate but chilly voice.

Shikamaru lifted his head hesitantly to look at her. "Wha..?" Another tear rolled down the wet path on his cheeks, following a tear- stained path that was left behind by previous teardrops.

Ino sniffled quietly before looking at him with slanted eyes. "We had sex, now we're regretting it. It's no big deal. People regret having sex with people all the time. Forget about it."

"What the-" Shikamaru straightened his back and stared her in the face. "What are you talking about?!"

"I SAID it's no big deal! When you get drunk, you sleep with people that you end up regretting ever sleeping with the next day. "She responded coolly.

His forehead crinkled in confused anger. "We didn't get drunk and have sex, Ino! I attacked you! Are you in denial?!" He unfurled his legs and stood up to his full height. "Dammit! It wasn't some one-night stand! I hurt you!"

"SHUT UP!" Her eyes blazed like intense blue flames. "JUST SHUT UP!" She squeezed her eyes shut and turned her face to the wall. "It was just a mistake from drinking too much. We'll just never talk about it again...and we can return to our normal lives..." The trembling hands that were sitting in her lap went to her hair to fiddle nervously at the soft strands.

He didn't believe it. He had no idea Ino would be this deep in denial. "You need to go to the hospital." He said in the most commanding voice he could muster.

"No I don't." She replied stubbornly. "Just go away! I don't want to see you! I'm fine on my own!"

"GODDAMMIT!" He yelled angrily at her and immediately felt guilty when she jumped. "I'm sorry that I yelled..." he meekly apologized but it was too late. Ino seemed to shrink even more among her sheets. She looked so fragile. It was then that he noticed the rash looking injuries on her skin. He was no fool. Shikamaru knew those injuries came from the efforts of a possessed woman who wanted to rid herself of every trace of rape. It was all his fault. He was the one who caused so much pain. He should be the one to suffer, not her.

One. Two. Three. He counted to himself as he breathed evenly in and out. With great heaviness in his heart, he started to speak again. "Ino, I want you to listen to me. Last night, I raped you. You were hurt pretty bad last time I saw. You need to go to the hospital. We didn't have sex because we were drunk. You didn't seduce me. It was one hundred percent, wholly and completely my fault and I'm so sorry.....so very sorry. I'm the one that needs to be punished so why are you endangering your life with a possible infection? If anything else happened to you....I don't know what I'd do.....please.....This isn't the way to punish me...It's too cruel to punish me by neglecting your own health."

Silence filled the room as two childhood friends let the weight of the information sink in. A long long time ago, they could be at the opposite ends of the world and still feel close to each other. Now, despite standing within the same room, they might as well be separated by the milky way.

Shikamaru knew it would be a while before Ino could bring herself to face what happened to her. He didn't want to be around to torment her anymore. He couldn't imagine the emotional stress she'd acquire from seeing her rapist day in and day out—sharing missions, trusting her body to him during her jutsu, camping out together and so forth. She wasn't able to trust him anymore. The camaraderie between them that was necessary for the survival of each shinobi no longer existed. He can't imagine her daring to leave him her body during her Shintenshin no jutsu. Especially since he wasn't sure he could trust himself. There was only one way to free Ino from him, to let her know that the world was on her side and the fault was his. He was a menace to society and deserved to rot with his own kind.

Shikamaru slowly walked to the window and noticed that all the objects in her room that indicated their lifelong acquaintance was gone. It was better that way, he felt. It meant that Ino was already on the path to reclaim herself. Too bad there was no path for him to follow that could lead to salvation. He was beyond saving.

"Ino......I'm so sorry.....and......goodbye." He disappeared out the window, leaving a gust of wind to follow behind him.

TBC (gomennn shikaaa-chaaaan)

Ch.3 is consequences.

Isn't angst great when it has nothing to do with ur personal life?

(YAWWWN) Ever have one of those nights when your body is really tired but you can't sleep because your brain wont shut up? (sooo tired)

Shikamaru: My brain and I have learned to coexist (moron). In fact, I'm asleep right now.

Maybe I should drink some tea for the caffeine.

Shikamaru: Would you drink tea if it were caffeine free?

Only if it was sweet like candy.

Shikamaru: Then why don't you drink juice instead?

But juice doesn't have the sophistication of tea.

Shikamaru: zzzzz (aho)

Ino: walks in hey guys! Whatcha doin?

Shikamaru: zzzzzz....

Oo (hides the fanfic)

Hey is it just me or is this chapter a lot less angsty? Or maybe it's cuz I'm used to this story now. Or maybe cuz I'm sleep deprived. Oh hoho now its video game time...oh wait simpsons first.