Disclaimer: Naruto does not belong to me

Got my hands on some new (well, new for me) anime so have been super busy ploughing my way through them this past few days. If anyone here hasn't watched Tenjou Tenge before, I really recommend it! There's only 24 episodes and it ends a bit abruptly unlike the manga, but the storyline is fantastic and super addicting!

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Konoha shinobi had a system of sending teams out in groups of threes. One was the leader, the others complemented each other in skills and knowledge. If push came to shove and one of them died, then having two remaining shinobi greatly increased the chance of at least one of them completing the mission and making it home.

But that was for attack missions. Sleuth ones were slightly different. Spying required almost complete silence, the teammates communicating more by experience and absolute trust than overt strategies. Moreover, the shinobi themselves tended to have slightly different abilities, ones that were more suited to information gathering and escape techniques than explosive fighting. Greater numbers meant a greater chance of getting caught. Two people were more than enough.

And that is the situation in which we find our hero and heroine. The mission had been successfully completed, they were on their way back from the Rain village and they should have been bickering comfortably as they always did. Instead, the atmosphere as they camped for the night around the low fire was oppressive. As suffocating as it had been for the past few months.

Our girl sat apart from him, her eyes fixed determinedly on the flickering shadows dancing across the dirt. The forest was eerily silent, the towering canopy nearly blocking out the moonlight and casting the two in darkness.

Now, Shikamaru was generally a fairly easy-going guy. He had no interest in gossip, training or anything that involved physical exertion really. That was probably one of the reasons he got along rather well with Ino. She would talk on and on while he drifted along beside her, occasionally putting in the required noncommittal sound while his mind filed away any necessary information that came out of her mouth.

Then she might demand that he do something for her, which he would have found troublesome coming from anyone else but would agree to nonetheless. Actually, Shikamaru still found it troublesome but he had long since come to terms with the knowledge that Ino was much easier to get along with if he kept her happy. So really, he didn't mind too much. When Ino was happy, she would laugh and hug him, her silky hair brushing against his face as she pressed against him briefly in a softly scented bundle of warmth. And that pleased him very much indeed.

But lately, she had been pulling away, the constant chatter and energy disappearing from his life as abruptly as the warm rays of sunlight on a cloudy day. It was unsettling, disturbing.

At first, he had tried giving her some space, giving her time for whatever it was that she was so angry about to blow over. But during that time, her anger had ended up shifting into sullenness, an inexplicable gap that Shikamaru belatedly realized had been borne partly out of his apparent indifference.

He then resorted to prodding her, following her around in the hope of annoying her enough to give her a reason to yell at him and get it out of her system. Chouji had been oddly amused by his old friend's sudden active approach, not saying anything in particular but merely grinning cheekily whenever he caught sight of the tall dark-haired boy trailing after the blonde like her shadow.

Nothing had worked though. It was always like this with Ino. She was the one person who seemed to be able to slip through his intricately laid plans and surprise him. Usually, he secretly found that refreshing but now, it was just plain troublesome. The fact that his promotion to Chuunin meant that he no longer went on missions solely with his old genin team had not helped mend the breach that seemed to grow wider and wider as the days passed.

Shikamaru watched as she refused to look anywhere in his direction. This had gone on long enough and even his formidable patience was starting to wan.

"Why are you doing this, Ino?"

She turned away from him. If he had been anyone other than Nara Shikamaru, he would have physically forced her head back around to face him. As it was, something like that was too troublesome and would have undoubtedly made her even more defensive. He hated that she was blocking him out, refusing to let him read her.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

He sighed.

"Don't lie to me, Ino."

She scoffed in reply, shifting closer to the fire in an attempt to warm the chill that seemed to have taken over her body for the longest time. Shikamaru watched her rub her hands together, shivering as the night wind nipped past them. He sighed again.

Strong hands enveloped her pale ones, chafing them gently between his own. Large blue eyes stared numbly at the sight of their clasped hands before slowly traveling up to fix on his face. The flames cast a soft glow on his tanned skin, the light reflecting in his dark eyes as they stared steadily into hers.

"Don't…"

She hated that her voice was trembling. The corner of Shikamaru's lips twitched upwards although his eyes remained serious.

"Don't what?"

Ino shook her head wordlessly, her mind unable to form what she wanted to say, if indeed, she even knew what she wanted to say. All she could focus on was the way his calloused fingers were stroking her skin. It was strange how quickly she had gone from being dead cold to burning hot. It was almost as if she was suffering from a fever.

The boy shifted closer, his broader frame shielding her from the worst of the night air. Almost instinctively, Ino leaned towards the heat radiating off of him, before she jerked back hastily.

"Don't do this, Ino."

She had always liked his voice. Ino could admit at least that much to herself. It was pleasingly low, a husky roll of words that slipped smoothly out between his lips almost like a purr. When you think about it, that very much suited his personality. The very sound of his voice conjured up images of lazy afternoon naps and indulgent pleasures.

Her eyes dropped away from his. It was hard to look at him. The thought surprised her and yet was not surprising at the same time. She had never had any trouble looking him in the eye, usually while yelling at him for some reason or other. But Ino was honest enough to realize how much she hid behind her loud voice. No, it had nothing to do with her self-confidence. It was more like she did not know how to face what she sometimes saw in his eyes. What he sometimes let her see. Something heady and breath-taking that flitted to the surface whenever they were enjoying a rare moment of quiet. Something tingly and frightening that patiently waited for her to recognize it.

Ino couldn't. Not yet.

"Shika…"

"She means nothing."

He was too smart. So Ino took the other route; she played dumb.

"I don't know what you mean."

Shikamaru simply squeezed her hands, his lips finally curving in a seldom-seen smile. Even in this mood, Ino could not help but smile back shyly. His eyes softened, that something emerging to the surface. He spoke before she could look away.

"No, don't turn away from me. I'm right here, Ino."

Her reply was cut off at the sudden stinging pain splintering her left arm. Ino looked down in bewilderment at the long needle glinting in the light of the fire, the tip of which was deep within her flesh as a thin stream of blood ran down her bare arm.

"What…?"

"Damn!"

With that, Shikamaru shoved her behind a bush, black meeting blue briefly before three Rain nin leapt down from the trees.

"Konoha, eh? Where's the rest of your little team?"

"Nowhere."

The boy stood there almost casually, his eyelids half-lowered in his usual drowsy appearance. But inside, his mind was working furiously. There were only three of them, meaning that he would probably be able to bind them long enough for Ino to escape. It was unfortunate that he was too low on chakra to use the more advanced Kagemane techniques or else he would have been able to get rid of them all at once. As it was, he would have to make do with Plan B. His shadow crept stealthily across the dirt to mingle with those of the other men.

Gotcha. Ino, get out of here!

Ino winced as she hastily pulled the needle out, ignoring the feel of warm blood seeping out of the open wound. She braced herself to leap out when she caught sight of his sharp glare and almost minute shake of his head.

No, Shika. There's too many of them for you to fight alone.

You might blame her for what she did next. Directly disobeying your team leader, who also happened to be Konoha's strategic genius, was stupid, plain and simple. Distrusting in your teammate's knowledge in the limitations of their own abilities was disloyal. Ino really was not either of these things and yet she displayed them here. Regardless, what happened, happened. She thought she was strong enough to protect him, strong like that awful sand shinobi.

You don't need her. I'm here.

Turns out she was wrong.

Ino was not strong enough to fight off the hidden nin that leapt down to attack her, was not smart enough to realize that Shikamaru would break his concentration and release his Kagemane on the other three in his instinctive attempt to help her. All she could do was watch, her mouth open in a silent scream as her attacker grabbed her roughly, his fingers digging cruelly into her forearms as he forced her to watch Shikamaru relentlessly fight a losing battle against the three other shinobi.

Maybe sometimes, it really is too late. Maybe when two people who were destined to share the same path take too many wrong turns, they can never find their way back again. If that was the case, then what can you do about it? What if there is really only one person whom you are destined to be with and that person, for some reason or other, is no longer around? Does that mean you are destined to be alone forever? Because if you find another love, that would mean you're messing up the whole chain of relationships by taking someone who is destined for someone else.

Or maybe, in very special circumstances, it is never too late. Maybe only one person strayed but the other was steady enough that they managed to guide them back home. Maybe if you take enough wrong turns, you'll end up back where you started and it is as if you never left in the first place. Or it could be that even if you both get lost, you could run into each other while being lost and then you would technically be found.

Whatever the conclusion, one thing is certain: every relationship is a story. A story where every single one of your actions has a consequence that you have no choice but to bear. A story whose pages can only be flipped forwards because there is no turning back.

Whether our hero and heroine ever sat down and moralized about such things is uncertain. It might have been too abstract for someone as direct as Ino and too troublesome for someone as lazy as Shikamaru. But somewhere deep inside each of them is the faintest glimmer of understanding similar to this. That some things cannot be erased and other things will affect their lives forever.

And now, at the end, she finally heard it.

With every slash of metal slicing through flesh, Ino heard what he had been telling her that night on the hill.

With every thud of his body being thrown against rock, Ino heard what she had seemed to be waiting her whole life to hear.

With every sickening crunch of bone being shattered, Ino heard what he had been telling her his whole life.

And even as she whipped around to sink her teeth into her captor's neck, even as she feverishly ripped his flesh out and the metallic taste of his blood filled her mouth as she broke free in a crazed, blinded slaughter of every Rain shinobi around them, Ino heard him as his broken and battered body slumped to the ground.

I love you, Ino.

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A/N: Yeah firstly, I just made that stuff up about the shinobi mission teams - I needed to get them out and alone and didn't really want to come up with some way for them to either ditch or kill off their other teammate.

Next chapter is the last one! WAAAAAH...coming to the end of this story! Update should be in a week or so. Thanks again!