Quiet. He recalls the quiet, how much he liked the quiet. Gave him time to move away from all the noise in his head. The flame illuminates the quiet, pulls it thin. He is beginning to recall…

She recognized the scent before she even opened her eyes: it was the fresh, green smell of a forest saturated with afternoon rain. Mist rose from the mossy floor, curling in hazy tendrils around the trunks of the trees. Where the sun ought to have been, a mass of dark clouds hung like spider webs heavy with dew, all but obscured by the arching canopy of the trees.

Ino passed through the door, stepping tentatively onto the wet ground. The quiet squelch of displaced earth met her ears the moment she set her foot down, and mud rushed into her sandal, cold between her toes. The feeling made her shiver.

While the previous layers of his mind had all possessed an air of realism, this one somehow surpassed them all. The authentic feel of the forest fairly dripped from the tip of every leaf, a picture-perfect reproduction of the outside world. Even taking a breath felt like sucking in a lung full of water, as droplets formed on her skin. Her hair was growing damper by the second, until miniscule beads threaded their way down her ponytail and onto her clothing.

Ino turned back for a moment, glancing at where the house had been, but it had vanished in the mist.

Well, she thought with a frown up at the sky, I suppose there's nothing to do but walk.

The rain came down in a steady drizzle as she walked, creating a small river of mud that wound through the bends of the forest. A moving trail of leaves, sticks and the occasional frog floated on its surface, swirling away into the depths of the mists.

As she walked, she waved bits of condensation out of her path, wondering at the presence of all this water. What if this was wrong? After all, Shikamaru had never cared much for rain. He liked to cloud-watch, and heavy storms interfered with that particular pastime. And the farther she walked, the more convinced she became that the steady deluge of rain and perpetual gloom didn't seem to be leading anywhere.

The mist. A nagging voice at the back of her head persisted in that notion, wondering. Relations with the Hidden Mist were as good as they had ever been, in accordance with the peace treaties that had followed the war. But remnants of the Blood Mist still had a hold in some of the more remote villages, lurking on the fringes of the nations' borders.

What had Tsunade said about the attackers? Between the haze of the rain and the throbbing from her head injury, Ino was having trouble remembering.

As she walked, she began to sense that she was not alone in the forest. Though no bird's cry or chitter of squirrels broke the silence, there was something that penetrated the heavy rain. It was like… like she was being watched.

It was a sort of sixth sense, knowing when you were being followed. And Ino had honed her ability to a precision that far surpassed that of either of her teammates. Maybe it was a side effect of inhabiting so many other minds. She just knew when things seemed off.

And they definitely were now. The more she moved, the more the feeling nagged at her, prickling across her skin and making her hair stand on end. Her extremities were growing cold, but she could feel her heart pounding furiously, pumping at twice the usual rate.

Snap.

She whirled around, striking out with a closed fist. But it just passed through the air, meeting no resistance. There was no one behind her.

Scanning the surroundings, she couldn't see anything conspicuous – no broken branches, no displaced leaves, nothing that suggested a pursuer. But she could have sworn she heard something. She allowed herself a few more minutes of silent observation, but when nothing came of it, she decided it was time to move on.

She tried taking deep breaths, convincing herself that there was really no reason to be alarmed. After all, it was just Shikamaru's mind. She had no reason to worry about real danger, didn't she?

Though, the injuries to her head and wrist seemed to suggest otherwise.

After what seemed an age of walking through dense, indistinguishable forest, she spotted a clearing in the distant. The sight flooded her with relief. At least there, she might be able to get a better idea of where she was going – or what she needed to do in this interminable maze of foliage.

But as she approached the clearing, the feeling of foreboding that had been following her only grew, clinging to her like a second skin.

Almost like…

And then she saw the first of the bodies.

Mrs. Yamanaka listened patiently as Tsunade and Shizune listed off the symptoms her daughter had experienced over the past two days, the frown on her face growing deeper with every new injury. Choji had been allowed to sit in on the discussion, though he was only half paying attention. Every few minutes, his eyes wandered to the glass. His teammates still hadn't moved. The medic on duty looked bored. It was all Choji could do not to go and shake the man. Didn't he know how important this was?

"…she's stable now, and we've bound her wrist, but she'll need some more serious healing when the procedure is finished." Tsunade set down the clipboard with her notes. "We're doing the best we can, but…"

Mrs. Yamanaka nodded, tapping the papers on her lap in a thoughtful gesture.

"I understand. These are… difficult circumstances. But I believe what I've brought might be of some use to you."

She passed the folder across to Tsunade, who opened it so that Shizune could also look over the contents.

"I'm not sure how much of my husband's chicken scratch you can decipher," she said, "but this is the account of his encounter with Shikaku's mind. Inoichi frequently described a person's mind as a three-layer system. Each layer hiding the next – a protective structure, of sorts, to keep crucial information compartmentalized. But in Shikaku's case, he talks of at least five layers."

"At least?" Tsunade raised an eyebrow.

"It was… a point of contention for him," Mrs. Yamanaka explained. "He estimated five layers, but according to his account, he only actually reached the fourth."

"Then how did he know there was a fifth?" Choji butted in without thinking. The deeper they delved into matters of the mind, the more he wished he knew about Ino's jutsu. There was so much he didn't understand about the entire situation, and it only made him feel more helpless.

"That's a good question." Tsunade agreed. She pointed to a paragraph on the third page of the account. "It says something here about defense mechanisms. I would imagine that had something to do with it?"

"Precisely," Mrs. Yamanaka said. "He was almost positive about the fifth layer, because the fourth was… barbed, as he put it. That layer was where he got ejected, because the defenses were simply too overwhelming. As if they were trying to protect something."

"He doesn't say what kind of defenses though." Shizune gave an exasperated sigh.

Tsunade passed the papers off to her apprentice, who continued to study them. She glanced over through the window, eyeing the two bodies in the next room.

"How long did you say he was unconscious following this incident?"

"Four days."

"Four." Tsunade shook her head, her gaze distant. "And he was only in Shikaku's head for a few minutes."

The sudden alarm that had crept into her tone worried Choji. If that was the effect of only a few minutes…

"What does that mean for Ino now?" He asked, not wanting to know the asnwer.

Tsunade opened her mouth. She closed it again.

"It means…" Mrs. Yamanaka supplied when the silence continued. "…that she's in quite a bit of danger, if Shikamaru decides she ought not to be there."

"And Inoichi was entering a mind that hadn't been tampered with." Tsunade added. She glanced over at Mrs. Yamanaka. "So we're dealing with at least five layers, containing defenses that have the ability to cause physical harm. That get more dangerous the deeper she descends."

"We think." agreed solemnly.

"Maybe not." Shizune chimed in. Three heads swiveled to look at her.

"It says right here…" she turned the page to face him. "Inoichi speculates that the defense mechanisms of the next-to-last layer – in Shikaku's case, the fourth – protect the most fundamental part of the mind. The control center, so to speak. He theorized that if he had been able to get past that next-to-last layer, he would have been in much safer territory." She looked up, the tiniest glimmer of hope shining in her eyes. "If Ino can get there, she might have a chance."

Four pairs of eyes turned to stare through the glass. Choji's stomach churned, and this time it wasn't hunger that plagued him.

Tsunade exhaled slowly.

"Monitor her very carefully."

The sight of mangled corpses was enough to turn anyone away, but that wasn't what got to Ino. She had seen bodies before. She had lived through a war, had seen peoples' lives slip away in red pulses through her useless hands. Bodies no longer bothered her.

No… it was the stench. Even now, after fights that all blurred together and a body count that was impossible to estimate, the smell of death was still almost too much for her. Maybe it was her sensitivity to smells in general – the daughter of a florist didn't get far in the world without a good nose. Perhaps that was why it so overwhelmed her – because she could discern every detail: the ammonic scent of fear, the sharp, putrid stench of dried blood.

It was all she could do not to turn back. If she had had anything on her stomach, she would have quickly rid herself of it. But she had to resist the turning of her stomach, move forward despite its protests. Filtering the smell with her hand cupped over her mouth and nose, she stepped forward into the clearing.

There were four bodies and the closer she moved, the more it sickened her. Familiar faces greeted her. The first she saw was Neji, two gaping holes seared clean through his chest. His body sprawled at an uncomfortable angle, like a broken-winged bird. His eyes were closed.

But… no. She shook her head. Though his body now lay buried in the cemetery of Konoha, it wasn't this body. He was much too young here, just… just a child, practically.

She moved on. There was Kiba, eyes staring glassily up at the gray sky. Naruto lay sprawled on the forest floor, no life in his limbs. Both young. Farther along in the brush, a limp tail poked out of the bushes. But even Akamaru was too small. This was more reminiscent of… of their Genin days.

She knew the last body even before she reached it. Even drained entirely of fat, she could have recognized that face from a mile off. Choji, slumped like a ragdoll, his back against a tree.

That only confirmed it. She knew this. Knew these four, knew this mission.

When Sasuke went rogue.

The memory still rankled. Ino hated feeling helpless, and she had never felt more helpless than when Sasuke had gone missing.

But her emotions, she realized, were not the ones of importance here. The mission to return Sasuke to the village had been Shikamaru's first real command. The mission that, she knew, still kept him up nights on occasion.

But it didn't go this way. She reminded herself. Neji and Choji had both been severely injured, but they'd survived. So… what was this?

A fresh wave of scent washed over Ino, and she gagged, closing her eyes against the sight.

"This isn't real," she muttered fiercely. "This isn't real, this didn't happen. Shikamaru got them all out alive, they all survived this battle."

She took a calming breath. She dared not breathe too deeply, lest she overwhelm herself with the stench of death, but she had to focus. Had to open her eyes. She would not be paralyzed by illusions of things that hadn't happened.

Slowly, cautiously, one lid fluttered open.

The area was clear, save for the drops that spattered across the grass, jumping in chaotic arcs before sinking down into the dirt.

Ino crept over the tree where Choji's body had been only moments before. When she touched it, it seemed solid enough. But there was no body in sight. Just the trees and the grass and the rain, one enormous mass of grey and green.

I just have to believe it isn't real. Just… just convince myself that what I'm seeing is just… just his fear.

She exhaled, one slow, unsteady breath.

She was going to move forward. These were Shikamaru's fears, not her own. It ought to be easier to conquer someone else's fears.

That thought was enough to maintain her on the long trek through the forest, as the paths became more winding and the branches snagged at her hair and clothes. The wind was picking up, adding a chill to the air.

Just a little further, she lied to herself. The delusion was necessary. If she thought about how long this maze might truly go on, she might just sit down and quit right here.

But she could make it through. She could conquer Shikamaru's fears. Now was no time for doubt, even as the feeling of being watched pressed ever closer, until it practically smothered her.

But that was a thought for another time, because as she reached the next clearing, all other thoughts drained from her head, replaced by the image before her.

The screeching of a monitor startled the attendant awake. He fumbled around for a moment, pushing his glasses back up the bridge of his nose to see what was making that awful noise.

BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.

When his head had finally cleared away the last remnants of his impromptu nap, it took a few seconds for him to realize that the sound was coming from the heart monitor in the room. It took only a few more for him to burst out the door and into the next room, throwing open the door to four startled faces.

"We've got a problem."

Something is breaking the quiet. A steady pulse, a flickering light. She is breaking the quiet. But then again…

…hasn't she always?

A/N: I suck at updating. No excuses. Just apologies. Sorry guys.

Thanks to star's dreams, ukrexican17, untouchable hexing witch, The Prisoner of Marzipan, nightskye01, FFNRocks, younggem, Guest, iIndefiniteReader, MakeItHayle, Guest 2, BrightAngel3, jazzberryjuice, milkahasii, kiwi4me, Rivendell101, Jen, drinkthatliquorstore, and BlackCatNeko999 for your incredible kindness and complimentary reviews, and all the rest of you who have stuck with this story despite my general failure at productivity. You guys are the best.

Let me know what you think. Peace.