Title: Seeking Rin
Chapter: 19 - Trill
Author: Killaurey
Rating: T
Word Count: 4,671
Summary: When Sakura, newly in a relationship with Kakashi, finds out about Rin, she makes a choice that's hard on them both. Even worse, there's a mysterious illness cropping up in Konoha that even Tsunade can't heal. And what does Ino have to do with it? Kakashi x Rin, KakaSaku.
Disclaimer: Naruto doesn't belong to me. It's Kishimoto's and I just play with it. Part 19 of ? Unbeta'd.


They start in Naruto's apartment-well, that's not quite true, they start on the rooftop they left Naruto and Temari on; neither of them are surprised to find they're both gone-and Ino perches on Naruto's counter while Shikamaru does the bulk of the work in searching the apartment.

"I'm a clone," Ino complains. "I'm not useless."

Shikamaru levels her with a solemn, dark-eyed look and goes back to his searching. His thoughts pound against her skull and she knows what he thinks anyway. That she's fragile.

The worst part is, he's right.

"Just keep looking for them with your mind," he says, after she sighs. "Can you get in touch with Naruto's clones?"

"Not at this distance," she says.

"Distance?"

"There's jutsu wards around where I am," she says primly. "You know they interfere with my range. Stop trying to get me to tell you where the real me is."

Never, reply his thoughts, though he says nothing.

Ino watches Shikamaru quietly as he works. She toys with her braids, tries not to listen too much to his thoughts-though that's a lost cause-and looks for Naruto.

"How did all of this start anyway?" Shikamaru asks abruptly.

Ino tilts her head. "I suppose with a botched experiment. The usual sort of thing."

He snorts.

"It's not that unusual," she protests.

"But to this extent?" he asks dryly. "What is so important that you had to mess with Sakura's brain?"

"I can't tell you that," she says, looking away.

"Can't?" he asks sharply. "Or won't?"

"Does it make a difference which one keeps me from being straight with you?" Ino wonders, twirling one braid around her fingers and watching him. She tugs her legs up under her chin and flops backwards, spread out on Naruto's counter. It's clean, since he hasn't been living here, so it's safe enough to do.

"I don't know," he says, subdued.

His thoughts tell a different story.

"Liar," she says, without heat, and rolls over onto her stomach. "Have you found anything yet? I haven't."

"You'd know if I had," Shikamaru says acidly. "Right?"

"Oh, come on," Ino complains, the whine in her voice matching the acid in Shikamaru's. "I've been doing that since the Academy. It's never bothered you before."

The angry pulse of his thoughts hum against her mind. It is uncomfortable and, truthfully, Ino likes it as little as he does and for similar reasons.

"I know," he says, after an aching moment. "I know that. It's just—you always had control before."

"Now I don't," she says softly. "Can we change the subject now?"

Shikamaru's hands clench, then deliberately unclench. Ino swings her feet and waits.

"Alright," he says, looking grim.

"Are you seriously going to bitch at me for keeping secrets right now?" Ino asks crossly. "So sorry I didn't break the law and tell you about the top-secret mission I was on."

She's not answering the question he asked, but it proves his point anyway. It makes her even grouchier.

This is why I didn't want to tell him, Sakura! she directs the thought viciously at Sakura, but Ino knows it doesn't reach her. If Ino reaches out, she can feel Sakura's mind, but already Ran is slinking into it bit by bit.

Ino wishes Sakura the joy of it and (quite honestly) hopes Sakura is more successful at it than Ino's own attempt had gone. (It hurt.)

There's a reason why she's (mostly) Rin, now, when no one else is looking.

"What?" Ino snaps.

Shikamaru just looks at her, he says, after a moment. "We'll keep looking."

That's the problem with Shikamaru, it really is. He might look like his head is in the clouds and, honestly, whenever it can be, it is, but when he's focused, really focused, it's like being ripped apart by someone who can see all her underpinnings.

It's even worse, now, feeling the thrum of his thoughts against her mind. She tries not to listen, she really does, but she's still getting far more than she wants from him.

Though he doesn't suspect the Rin part of it. Not yet. That's a relief.

He knows she's still holding something back from him. The only reason he isn't pursuing it is because he's saving that for the real her.

Ino is surprisingly grateful that she's just a shadow clone. If he pushes her too hard, she can disappear. And even if he stalks through every shadow in the village… well, she's not exactly in the village. He might find her eventually but not quickly.

"I don't like the way Naruto disappeared," she says, and that's the truth, which helps as she hops off the counter with a flirt of her hair. "What could take out Naruto and Temari-san? Without anyone noticing a thing?"

"I've been thinking about that," he says. "For most shinobi there's always someone better or the chance to catch them off guard. No one is invulnerable."

The catty part of her wants to say something snide about 'not even Temari-san?' but, no, she's been really good about keeping her mixed feelings on the Sand kunoichi close to her chest, so she says nothing. It won't help anyway.

Ino can change minds, quite literally, but she's never considered doing so in the name of love. It wouldn't be the same.

Shikamaru loves Temari-san. He loves her, too, just not the way that she wants him to.

"But?" she prods.

"Temari's good but there's a lot of shinobi who are good. Someone could have taken her out easily enough. Naruto's easy enough to fool," he says, frowning. "But his passenger is a whole different story."

Now Ino wants to defend Naruto, but she can't. He's very different from the boy he used to be but, in the village, surrounded by friends? They're all easier to fool—not just him.

"If he's not injured, I don't know that the Kyuubi would do anything," Ino says thoughtfully. "Theirs is a weird relationship. Kyuubi will protect Naruto if it looks like Naruto's going to die but… for anything else? It's hard to say. And if something managed to knock Naruto out quick enough that he couldn't react then it's possible that the Kyuubi didn't have enough time to react."

"Tch."

Ino hesitates for a moment, not quite sure if saying anything to Shikamaru is exactly smart but he can't solve anything without all the pieces.

"I wonder if we're not looking at it the wrong way," she says. "Maybe it wasn't a third party involved at all."

She can feel his thoughts, ready to dismiss hers as jealousy, now that he knows how she feels. It's so deeply, incredibly irritating. All of her effort to keep him from being aware of her feelings and Sakura just had to ruin it…

Ino gets why. She does. But it's so frustrating.

"Did you know Temari-san has mind shields not of Yamanaka make?" she asks before Shikamaru can figure out a way to put his dismissal into words.

That catches him off guard, not having expected something like that.

"No," he says slowly. Then, because even when it comes to the woman he loves, he thinks: "Has she always had mind shields?"

"I haven't spent a lot of time in her head," Ino says sardonically, since the very idea of that would just be like flaying herself alive. "But no, she hasn't."

Ino would have noticed that even in just routine checks. She's touched every ninja in Konoha's mind at one point or another. It's her job to keep an eye out for abnormalities.

"I would have noticed during my village-wide sweeps," she continues. "That's the sort of thing we're trained to keep an eye out for. Any sort of resistance. Some people have natural resistance to my Clan but that's something we notice while they're young. It's something people are born with. People don't just… grow shields spontaneously, though a fractured mind can sometimes feel like they have."

He grunts and she can feel his irritation.

Ino shrugs at him. "Temari-san was acting like normal, though, as far as I could tell, and that's something you'd have more experience in than I would."

She's spent an awful lot of time trying not to get too close to her. Ino knows in broad strokes the shape of Temari's personality and her moods but she hasn't wanted to know her better. Friendly acquaintances had been her goal and, until all of this, she'd felt good about her success.

"Let me think," he says.

With another shrug, half an apology, if he wants to read it that way, Ino falls silent. She even tries not to listen to his thoughts, turning her own, instead to where they could possibly be. Naruto's place has been a bust, which hadn't surprised her.

Temari-san usually stays at Shikamaru's place when she's in Konoha. Ino mulls over that before deciding she'll let Shikamaru suggest it.

He will. He's too good a shinobi to not, no matter how little he likes it.

So where else?

Reluctantly, she decides that she should probably suggest both her and Sakura's apartments. She can't see why someone would bring Naruto and Temari there but… reciprocity does matter. More realistically, the Sand embassy would be a good place to check.

"She's been more tired than usual lately," Shikamaru says abruptly, interrupting her train of thought. "And having headaches. I thought it was just stress."

He doesn't like having to wonder if it has been more than that, but Ino can't feel bad about it, not when Naruto's missing too.

"It could just have been stress," she allows, mostly just to make him feel better. "But it's suspicious under current circumstances."

Ino shrugs a little. "I think we're done at this apartment. Where did you want to go next? Should we check out all of our places?"

It's the most diplomatic way she can think to suggest that his apartment might have clues in it, if Temari is really embroiled in some sort of plot. Ino knows that there's plenty of suspicious things in both hers and Sakura's apartments—because most of them, she's put there herself. But they're also not things that Shikamaru will consider to be suspicious.

He's always been too quick to dismiss 'girl stuff' as being unworthy of being paid attention to. Likewise, Ino has always found that hiding things in 'girl stuff' to be an excellent sort of cover. Shikamaru is hardly the first shinobi, and definitely won't be the last, to underestimate a kunoichi that celebrates her femininity in frivolous, fun ways.

"Or," she adds, "we could check out the embassy. If there's something weird going on with Temari-san then it probably has its origins there. The Kazekage is committed to peace but not all of the Sand nin are as committed."

"Let's check out my place first," Shikamaru says grimly. "Then we'll try the Sand embassy. If there's something she's left around my apartment, then I want to know about it."

Saying that hurts him, but Ino gives no indication of knowing that. He's a proud shinobi of Konohagakure no Sato. If there's an ugly truth somewhere, he'll face it head on.

Ino bumps his shoulder affectionately as they leave Naruto's place.

It turns out that, if there is something in Shikamaru's apartment that's a clue neither her nor Shikamaru can spot it. This leaves Shikamaru in somewhat of a better mood (relief will do that to a person) and Ino is glad for him. Her own problems with Temari-san are just that: hers.

She hopes, for his sake, that Temari-san isn't a traitor. If she's a victim it will be better, for a certain definition of the word.

"Where too next?" she says, as they lock his place up behind them. "Mine or Sakura's?"

"Temari's never been to either of your places," Shikamaru says meditatively. His thoughts muse on how he'd noticed that before but now that he knows about Ino's feelings, he understands why. Ino doesn't have the heart to explain that it hadn't had to do with just that. Other than Sakura, most people haven't been invited to her place in the last two years. Shikamaru and Chouji have been there but she doesn't invite them—they just show up.

"We'll try the Sand Embassy first," he decides. "We can just walk in, so that's easily done."

"We're just going to walk in?" Ino says, outraged and only partly for show. "Into the Sand Embassy? What a waste of good fun! We could filch the blueprints from the Administrative Offices and ninja our way in."

They're making their way along the rooftops towards their target and she could keep her conversation to a mental level but, honestly, any Konoha ninja that hears her is going to keep their mouths shut. Suna having an official embassy in Konohagakure is still new enough to cause a lot of suspicion and not every ninja is willing to forgive their role in the destruction of a good part of the village when Orochimaru had attacked and killed the Sandaime.

Politically it made perfect sense that Tsunade-sama would forge an alliance with Suna, especially once Gaara took over as Kazekage.

That didn't mean everyone had to like them having a permanent presence in the village.

And Tsunade-sama could command a lot of things, up to and including a veneer of civility from her shinobi, but she couldn't command people to be happy about something.

"Ino," Shikamaru says flatly, though she can tell he's genuinely amused. "I'm dating the ambassador. We can just walk in."

"Well, yes," she grumbles, then she grins at him. "But you can't deny that my way would be more fun."

Despite himself, he laughs.

She wraps the sound around herself.

"Let's try it my way first," he suggests. "We walk in, ask to see Temari, and see where that gets us. They're used to me. It would be less troublesome to do it my way."

They're not used to her but she gets his point, the one that he thinks and doesn't say: she only has a limited amount of energy and, as a shadow clone she's much more fragile than a human would be. One good blow would be enough to dispel her, sending her memories spiraling back to the lab.

"And if we don't get very far?" Ino asks.

He smirks at her. "Then we'll try it your way."

Ino pumps one fist into the air. "Victory will be mine!"

"My way first," he repeats.

She waves that off as unimportant, tilting her head down at the street. "Shall we go to ground level?"

His hesitation thrums against her mind. Ino, feeling greatly generous, refrains from rolling her eyes but only barely. "If we're going to do it your way first then we kind of have to go down into the street," she points out blithely, like she hasn't noticed his hesitation at all.

Partly because it's annoying but also because she hates that part of her thinks it's sweet he's so concerned about her shadow clone.

"Luckily it's not too crowded here—I hate the streets near the markets where there's so many people it's almost impossible to get down without landing on someone! Okay," she says, since he really has no reasonable objection and they both know it, she hops over to the edge of the roof and then, as she jumps, calls back, "down we go!"

She hears him swear but he follows her all the same. Like she'd known she would, Ino lands without incident—Naruto's makes sturdy clones and has since he was twelve—and she grins at Shikamaru, who gives her a dire look, like he's a cat that's been sprayed with water.

"Since it's your plan, you take the lead," she says loftily.

"I notice that you only say that now that we're on the ground," he observes.

Ino shrugs a little. "Were we going to enter in through a window and congenially ask the first Sand-nin that we came across where Temari-san is? That sounds like a good way for things to not go well but if you're really married to the idea…"

"It's crap like this that's the reason why I don't go on missions with you anymore," he mutters, as they round the street corner towards the embassy. "You're annoying."

He doesn't mean it and, right now, his thoughts are mourning that they might not be able to go on future missions together.

"I get the job done," she says brightly, which she does. Always.

It's one of the reasons she was chosen for this mission in the first place. Compatibility with Rin and Ran had been important, yes, but equally so was the hell-bent drive and stubbornness to see it through to the end. She'd failed as Ran. That is up to Sakura now and she hopes Sakura does better than she had.

But Ino is an excellent Rin.

She's dying, of course, but all Rins die. It's part of the process they're trying to break free of. Until they do, well… her sheer bloody-minded, implacable will is going to serve her greatly, right until she breathes her last.

And, this is the part that Tsunade-sama doesn't know, though she must suspect, it's going to serve both Sakura and her even beyond the grave if it has to. Ino has had nothing to do but make plans for months. She has made them. There is failsafe on top of failsafe in a complex, raveled loop, that no one but her and Sakura will ever be able to figure out.

She'll break the cycle but, more importantly, she's going to make sure that Sakura survives it. Ino's going to do her best to survive as well but Sakura's introduction at this late a stage means that Ino can't even pretend that her odds can be evened out to give herself a fifty-fifty chance.

But she'll get the job done. No matter what.

He can't argue that, and he hates it like poison. Ino feels it coiling in his veins.

And then she feels something else, not coming from him, but coming from the Sand embassy.

"Wait," she says, grabbing his arm and dragging him to the side of the street, so that anyone at the embassy can't see them. Why are Konoha nin pretending to be Suna nin while they guard the entrance?

Shikamaru moves with her, easily, and though he winces a little at the volume of her mind's voice (her control is embarrassingly bad these days but it's still safer than speaking out loud; as far as she knows, her Clan is the only clan with a mind-reading ability) he doesn't protest. They've never had trouble working together when it's mattered.

Run that past me again.

There's a bunch of ninja from our village pretending to be Suna nin as they guard the entrance to the Sand Embassy. Ino, using Shikamaru as a balance, undoes her sandal and pretends to shake pebbles out of it as a cover. I'm guessing that's not normal?

She honestly doesn't know. She's been rather… otherwise occupied these days.

It's not normal. Shikamaru's mind voice is dark. I know every Suna nin in that embassy, Ino.

As she puts her sandal back on, Shikamaru grumbles about her not needing to use him as a pole, and she laughs as she straightens. He rolls his eyes. It's all perfectly normal. They rejoin traffic in the street, him slouching and her shaking her head, sending her braids flying out around her.

You still want to try your way first?

Yeah. If they've done their homework, they'll know I'm usually allowed in without question. My showing up to visit won't raise any eyebrows or suspicions. If we're turned away… that tells us something.

"Do you think she'll be available?" Ino says, switching to speaking aloud. "If she's not, that's too bad. It's the last day of the movie and you said she's been wanting to see it."

And what movie is this? Shikamaru asks sardonically. Give me a synopsis. Try to make it something she'd actually watch.

He shrugs a little. "If she's too busy, we'll just rent it when it comes out on tape."

"Ugh! That's totally not the same experience at all!" she protests, laughing. "The big screen gives it more weight."

It's called The Missing. It's about an entire class of Academy children going missing on a field exercise and their sensei's attempt to discover what happened to them. I've seen it twice; it's absolutely chilling. And it's definitely worth seeing on the big screen!

"You're such a snob," he says. But Temari would probably enjoy that. I would enjoy that. Is today really the last day it's out?

Yeah, sorry.

You should have invited me.

"Guilty," she says, as they approach the embassy. "Hey, guys!"

Up close, Ino admits that they've done a good job at making them look like Suna shinobi. If it wasn't for their minds, she wouldn't guess just upon approach. She approves of that because Ino admires the skill it takes to have done so, even as she plots ways to figure out what's going on. They hadn't counted on this. Is this some sort of ploy by Suna behind Gaara, the Kazekage's back? Something that Tsunade-sama is working on?

Or is it a result of them trying to break the cycle? The cycle heavily resists being broken… but could it do all of this?

"Hey," Shikamaru says to the guards. "Can we go in? We're looking to see Temari."

"Unfortunately, Nara-san, Temari-san is currently in meetings and is unavailable." One of the guards says. It's a smooth response, it sounds very natural.

"Tch." Shikamaru shoves his hands into his pockets. "Fair enough. Let her know I was looking for her, will you?"

The other guard nods. "Of course, Nara-san."

"Thanks," he says, with a wave.

"Bye, guys!" Ino chirps, following Shikamaru as he slouches off. Nice and simple and didn't work. Impressive disguises though.

Almost. Shikamaru shakes his head a little. They were too polite, too formal. Suna shinobi tend to be less 'unfortunately' and more just 'no'.

"Since we couldn't see Temari-san, let's go get lunch and then go to the movie anyway," Ino says, hooking one arm through his. "It's too bad Chouji isn't here, we could have made it a team thing."

You're the reason Chouji isn't here. "Alright," Shikamaru says. "But you're paying."

"That's no way to treat a lady!" she says, and they squabble good-naturedly about whether or not she counts as a lady all the way until they're seated at a café and have been given their menus.

Can shadow clones actually eat? he asks as their server rattles off the specials.

Sure can, Ino says, while thanking the server and ordering them both tea. They always drink the same kind and have since they were children. Chouji's the hard one to order for, when it comes to drinks, since he always changes his mind. It doesn't help sustain me as a clone but I can consume things, just like any one else. It's almost a shame I'm not deathly allergic to anything. This would be a good way to eat my allergens and not actually die of them!

Shikamaru laughs, short and sharp, but amused. "That's awful," he says. "How much time until the movie?" Are we actually eating here?

She makes a show of checking her pockets for the information as she asks. You hungry? We can if you want.

Tea's fine. If it comes to a fight, I hate being full.

Let's hope it doesn't come to a fight in the village.

It wouldn't be the first time or the last time, she expects, that there's fighting in Konoha but that doesn't mean Ino wants to see her home destroyed—and ninja are very good at destroying things when they're defending their lives.

"Oh no," she says, as if she's actually dismayed. "It looks like I misjudged the time. We've only got twenty minutes instead of an hour and twenty!"

"You're such a ditz," Shikamaru complains, even as the server comes back with their teas. Luckily, they're in to-go cups. "Now we'll have to eat after the fact and I'm hungry now. Can't we get a later showing instead?"

"No!" she says, and explains the situation to their server, gets the bill, and pays in quick succession, the very picture of contriteness. "Hurry up, I'll meet you by the theatre!"

Rooftop, Hanabi Hotel!

Ino disappeared in a quick burst of smoke and leaves, landing right where she said she was going and trusting that he'll know which Hanabi hotel she'd meant. She sips her tea and takes a seat, tucked just so where they won't easily be able to see her from the Sand embassy.

When Shikamaru arrives, seconds after her, he is pissed. "You're supposed to be conserving energy!"

"Don't worry about it," she says. "I've got plenty and that jutsu takes so little that walking back here would've taken more—especially since we would have had to detour all over the place so that no one noticed we weren't near the theatre."

He's still mad but logic does what it usually does to him, and he settles himself down next to her. He's brought his tea too.

How well do you know the inside? Ino asks, as she looks out at the scenery and enjoys that it's a lovely day out, really, and if she wasn't worried about Naruto (and, fine, she's a little worried about Temari-san… for Shikamaru's sake) the fact that they were up to something highly illegal would just be a delightful way to spend the day. They're long past being able to excuse it as a childish prank but the emotions she feels now are similar to how she'd felt whenever they'd get one over Asuma-sensei.

When I first started visiting, I pulled the floorplans and memorized them. I've seen about half the rooms.

She hides her grin with her cup. In case you had to make a quick escape from Temari-san's wrath?

"I will toss you off this roof." But he doesn't mean it.

"I'd like to see you try," she replies, knowing he won't, not right now, even if he did actually mean it. It takes some of the fun of being a brat out of it. And the best place to break in is…?

He thinks.

Ino, in an effort to ignore his thoughts pressing against hers, turns her own mind inward, looking for the bright strand of chakra that usually connects her and Naruto. He's channeled to her so often that even though it's missing, she can still find the dim and faded outline of where it ought to be. When she tries to trace it, though, it just fizzles to nothing as soon as she's past the confines of her body.

Third floor, second window on the right. I'll go first.

His tone of voice says he won't accept an argument. She doesn't give him one, just finishes her tea. When you're ready then.

Shikamaru closes his eyes, running through the odds, then is gone. Follow my lead.

They slip like shadows across the roof, using the angle of the sun to help hide their approach. The two buildings are close enough that the jump is one she could have made when she was seven. Easily. She keeps an eye out (and a mind out) for anyone who might spot them while Shikamaru works his way through the jutsu ward.

Got it. She hears the window open and Shikamaru stepping inside.

She feels his complete and total shock and hurriedly swings down after him, through the window too quickly to be seen. Ino sees the room but, for a long kaleidoscope of moments, her mind (her mind) can't make sense of what she's seeing.

For a long moment neither of them speak.

Then he says: "What the fuck."