A/N- I'm so sorry that this is later than usual but it is a bit longer so I hope that makes up for it, I've just had a long week. So I hope you enjoy this 6.8k word chapter which I probably should have just made into two separate ones but oh well! Anyways enjoy!
The four Hidden Leaf shinobi stood watching the village burn right in front of their eyes, their feet planted to the ground as they looked over all the death that littered the ruins.
Shikamaru wanted to move so badly, but his body was showing signs of betraying him as he stood there frozen once the familiar voice reached his ears.
"Shikamaru…" he heard Temari whisper next to him, "is that who I think it is?" he noticed her voice was slightly higher than usual, her breath panicky.
He gulped audibly "Yea—" the Leaf Shinobi was interrupted as a billowing, black sleeve was wrapped around his shoulder whilst the rogue shinobi wrapped his other arm around Temari, pulling them both towards him.
"It's been a while! Hasn't it, Shikamaru?" a familiar, mischievous voice asked in his ear. Naruto looked between the two shinobi he had his arms wrapped around, "So…" he grinned "Are you two on a date right now?" he laughed heartily as he saw Temari and Shikamaru both blush and try to look away, but they were held in place by Naruto's subtly firm grip.
"You know that's not why we're here, Naruto!" Shikamaru craned his neck to stare him down, making the jinchuriki laugh even harder.
"What did you do to this place?" Temari asked shakily as Ino and Choji stood back, their body's quaking.
Naruto's eyes gave off an insatiable hunger as they roved over the destruction he'd caused, his bloodlust shining through as he grinned. Shikamaru's eyes widened when they'd caught the glint coming off from his canines. There was something inhuman about them and it took longer than it usually would for Shikamaru to realise that they had extended into dangerously sharp fangs. Shikamaru's Adam's apple felt like a stone in his throat as he imagined those vampiric fangs tearing someone's throat open.
His attention was drawn back to the carnage when he heard the sound of a sword being sheathed back into its scabbard. Another man stood in the middle of all the death and destruction, wearing a loose black cloak patterned with red clouds, each cloud as red as the right eye of the Uchiha clan's last descendant's infamous kekkai genkai. His hair, almost as dark as Shikamaru's, was tied up in a bun at the back whilst his eyes were half-covered by the curtains that framed his sharp features.
As he strolled away from the corpse he'd withdrawn his Kusanagi blade from, his boots echoed even through all the cackling of the flames behind him. He drew closer to the group of Leaf Shinobi, his eyes drifting over them lazily as if he was in no danger, without a care in the world. He looked over towards Naruto, their gazes locking as they communicated through body language alone, Sasuke giving Naruto an unimpressed expression as he looked over the two shinobi in his arms.
"We didn't do much…" The Uchiha spoke as he looked towards Temari, "just dealing with some very uncooperative people"
"So you just butchered them like animals?" Shikamaru couldn't help but grimace. He was tugged by the rogue shinobi behind him, his face pulled right next to his.
"Believe me! The world we're creating has no place for people like them" Naruto expressed coldly.
Naruto felt the Leaf shinobi and the Sand kunoichi tremble as he looked over them closely. He noticed Shikamaru had become a lot more toned since the last time he saw him, his shirt sat a bit tighter on his arms, his sleeves rolled a little up his arms to reveal his veiny forearms covered in about a dozen black hair ties that matched the one that held together his pitch-black hair in his signature ponytail.
When he looked over his sharp jawline, Naruto eyes were drawn to his cut on his cheek, and as he was curious about it, the Uzumaki made a mental note to ask him about it later.
He turned his head towards the foreign girl in his other arm, she was taller than most of the other girls back in the Leaf Village, standing at about five feet and eleven inches tall she was taller than a lot of the guys in the Hidden Leaf, which caused a lot of them to not even try to chat to her. That was only one reason however, as her feisty personality was enough to drive a lot of men away from the intimidatingly superior girl, her tongue sharper than any kunai. Her demeaning nature was only matched by her assigned escort, the young head of the Nara clan, his genius made him one of the only men in Hidden Leaf Village that the man hating Temari considered worthy.
His presence always managed to scare off any annoying nuisances for Temari, he'd let the brave few, who thought they'd get lucky, talk to her awkwardly and let them squirm under her disapproving stare before he crushed their pathetic hopes, saying "she's not interested" possessively, with a cruel smile on his face. She'd always smile internally when he did that but always keeping her composed demeanour afterwards, offhandedly thanking him for his help.
The two of them spent most of their days together, usually working in a stuffy old office but when they had free time they often decided to spend it together by competing against one another. Shikamaru had noticed that Temari had continuously gotten more competitive with him ever since he had practically beaten her in the chunin exams long ago, before he had given up on their bout and now, every chance Temari has to go against him, she takes it, challenging him to all different types of competition, Shogi matches, practice duels, one time they had even competed in a word association game.
And now in this moment in time, all their battles had accumulated in the complete understanding between the two of them, as they glanced at each other in Naruto's grip, they tried their best to formulate a strategy to get out of their current situation, shrugging and darting their eyes towards Naruto and Sasuke whilst raising their eyebrows almost as if they were arguing telepathically.
Their silent conversing was cut short abruptly however as their attention, along with Naruto's and Sasuke's, was drawn to the kunoichi behind them. At some point after Sasuke had arrived on the scene of his massacre, Ino's body's trembling had switched causes from her fear of Naruto and his overwhelming, dominant presence to the hate she felt when she laid eyes on Sasuke.
As she watched the Uchiha stand there in front of her, looking over her and her friends, Ino 's mind began to flood with thoughts of her best friend, Sakura. She couldn't quite believe that Sasuke was just stood there so nonchalantly, she felt her blood boil just thinking about how he had tortured her for the last five years, since he left the Hidden Leaf Village. She'd spent countless nights comforting her oldest friend, seeing her cry her heart out until her tear ducts were empty. She had been especially worse these last two years after Naruto had joined Sasuke and left her all alone.
When Sakura had told Ino what happened before the two of them left her, when Sasuke had put her in a genjutsu and how that same dream tortured her every night. Ino had ended up pitying the poor girl so much that she decided to take matters into her own hands one night and satisfy her as well as she could with her lack of experience.
Now the man who had toyed with her friend until he ultimately took her away from Ino was here, and she could no longer hold herself back from the misery she'd been in since he'd taken Ino's closest friend from her.
"Sasuke!" She stomped forwards recklessly, "Where is she?"
"Where is who?" he asked with a blank look on his face.
"Sakura! What did you do to Sakura?" her pretty face was contorted in rage.
Sasuke's eyes widened with his grin as they gleamed with cruel delight. Ino looked confused as she was embroiled in her interrogation yet still managing to catch Naruto's snickering behind her.
"What's so funny?" Temari asked Naruto next to her as she gritted her teeth in frustration.
"What's funny is that the question she should really be asking is…" Naruto moved closer to gauge the kunoichi's reaction, "what didn't we do to Sakura?" he smirked as Temari's face turned a bright shade of red.
"Does that mean she's still alive?" Naruto turned round to see Shikamaru's worried expression.
"As long as she continues to be useful to us in some way" Sasuke stated.
Shikamaru's brain was firing faster than ever now, trying to rub together every single cell to come up with a solution, a way out of this situation. They needed to get back towards the Hidden Leaf Village, maybe they could get some reinforcement from the ANBU Black Ops or any of the more powerful shinobi of the village.
If he could break Temari and himself free from Naruto's grasp, then they could use the Ino-Shika-Cho formation to try to fend off the rogue shinobi, taking them on at medium range with Shikamaru's Shadow Stitching jutsu, guarding at close range with Choji's Expansion jutsu, creating distance at long range with Temari's Wind Scythe jutsu and utilising the threat of Ino's Mind Destruction jutsu to keep them from attacking them carelessly.
He thought about all the risks of this strategy, one of them being Naruto and Sasuke's incredible speed and power which might overwhelm them before they can really set their defensive formation, another being that they might not find out where Sakura is which could doom her as for all Shikamaru knew, she could be in serious need of aid and she would always be a useful asset to the Hidden Leaf's might.
The risk that terrified him the most however, was the idea that they could fight tirelessly for ages until they managed to retreat close enough to the Hidden Leaf Village in order to be reinforced but then the reinforcements wouldn't be strong enough to take on these two god level shinobi. Shikamaru could only think of three ninjas in the village who might have enough power to go one-on-one with them, those shinobi being Kakashi Hatake, who had worked nonstop for the last two years after the war to become even stronger to make up for his lack of the Sharingan's visual prowess that he had possessed for years.
Another powerful shinobi in the Hidden Leaf would be Rock Lee as, without Might Guy, Lee was the only one who could open the Eight Inner Gates' Eighth Gate of Death which would give him enough power to go toe-to-toe with one of Akatsuki currently in view. The last of the three shinobi would be Lady Tsunade herself however Shikamaru believed that it would take a very specific circumstance for the Fifth Hokage to keep up with Naruto and Sasuke, even with her Byakugou seal activated.
If none of those three showed up when they made it back to the Hidden Leaf Village, then an enormous number of shinobi from the village would die for the lost cause of Shikamaru and his teammates surviving. All these thoughts ran through Shikamaru's head as his eyes darted around, surveying the situation he and his team was in. He took in Naruto's body language behind him, casual as he was leaning on Shikamaru and Temari as he watched Ino shout at Sasuke with sadistic glee.
He made it look as though he were embracing two old friends, when in reality he had them trapped in a dangerous grip. His fingers were relaxed as he let them hang down their collarbones but at any moment they could wrap around their throat, his black and orange painted nails ready to claw through their windpipes with no mercy.
Sasuke was a few metres in front of Shikamaru, staring down the fiery Ino as she aggressively shook her fist at him. His eyes shone crimson and violet respectively as he watched her with a smug look on his face. Shikamaru needed a way to help her because he knew for certain that Sasuke would defeat her without breaking a single drop of sweat.
The most likely way he would be able to that would be to have Choji back her up, the only issue that Shikamaru could think of with that plan was that Choji was about a couple metres behind himself, Temari and Naruto. Shikamaru shook his head as thought about how much he was doubting his own ideas, of course Choji could back Ino up with his Expansion jutsu, he'd worked with the Akimichi for years and been friends with him even longer than that, but he still couldn't stop all the doubts from muddling his mind as he panicked over how to keep his friends safe.
Shikamaru needed to calm himself down quickly before he made a crucial error that might cost one of his team their lives. He felt his hands come together, joining each fingertip to the other as he formed his strange hand sign that he subconsciously did whenever he needed to think even harder than he usually did. As he stood there thinking with his fingers forming a cradle-like shape, Shikamaru slowed his breathing down, gaining full control over his rampant thoughts as he discarded all the doubts and what ifs that invaded his mind. He carefully sifted through each plan, weighing the pros and cons of each one on an imaginary scale.
He wasn't sure how long he was still for as he continued to focus on his tactical ideas inside his own mind scape, his mind palace, but Shikamaru estimated that it must have been for only a moment or two. One thought almost ripped him out of his concentration immediately before he managed to regain his focus. "Where is Hinata?" he thought. The Hyuga clan's rogue heiress was nowhere to be found. Shikamaru theorised that she might be lurking around, trailing behind Naruto and Sasuke and using her ridiculously long ranged visual prowess to keep an eye on the situation of her comrades from kilometres away. The other reason Hinata wasn't around could have been for the fact that she was wherever with Sakura, possibly holding her hostage, but without anyway to be certain, Shikamaru decided to just do his best to react quickly if and when she ever did arrive at the scene of their upcoming battle. All his strategizing came to an abrupt stop when he heard a childish snicker next to his ear as it strained to gather more information whilst his eyes were closed.
"Hey Sasuke look here!" Naruto called to his friend, "It seems like Shikamaru has a plan to beat us!" he laughed as he looked down at the pensive Leaf shinobi in his grasp.
Sasuke turned his attention towards his comrade used his keen eyes to attempt to figure out what Shikamaru was actually doing. The Uchiha knew that the Nara was a genius with an IQ level of over two hundred, but what also concerned Sasuke was that he wasn't entirely sure he knew how powerful Shikamaru's hidden ninjutsu, the Shadow style jutsu of the Nara clan, could become when it was used by ninja with such intelligence. Sasuke activated his Sharingan to look even closer at whatever Shikamaru was doing whilst his eyes were closed, however once his dojutsu was activated it caught the movement of hands in the corner of his right eye.
Ino saw her opportunity for revenge whilst Sasuke's attention was directed at Shikamaru, she weaved the hand signs for one of the most dangerous hidden ninjutsu of the Yamanaka clan. When she finished she aimed dead centre of Sasuke's head, right between his eyes with her completed hand sign for the Mind Destruction jutsu. Thanks to his Sharingan's most basic ability to read opponents' hand signs and comprehend everything in sight within milliseconds, combined with the Yamanaka clan's jutsu's slow speed, Sasuke managed to activate his Rinnegan's ability and switched places with the corpse behind him, successfully avoiding the Mind Destruction jutsu.
"Fuck! What a drag!" Shikamaru thought as he realised all his plans had been pretty much thrown out the window because of Ino's temper. He needed to something quickly of they had any chance of getting out of this, so he switched his hand sign to one of his more powerful Shadow jutsu, knowing full well that it wouldn't be able to hold Naruto for long. His Shadow Bind jutsu connected to Naruto instantly due to the physical contact they were already making and as Shikamaru's chakra infused shadow began to creep up Naruto's limbs and coil around him, Shikamaru hoped that Temari would catch on to his plan.
Thankfully she did, as she wrestled herself free of Naruto's arm before twirling around as she reached behind her for her fan and, knowing that Shikamaru's Shadow Binding jutsu would probably only hold Naruto in place for a few moments, she used her Wind Scythe jutsu to blast him back to create as much distance between Shikamaru and herself and Naruto.
Shikamaru, now with space to breath, turned towards Choji behind him.
"Choji! Go grab Ino now!" he ordered his teammate.
The young Akimichi heir snapped out of his fearful trembling quickly as soon as he heard his oldest friend's order. He rushed forwards, arching his back as he reached forwards, almost like he was pitching a ball, and as his arm extended towards Ino, it expanded, spanning the distance between them. He wrapped his fist around the kunoichi and yanked her towards him before Sasuke could react.
As his giant arm drew back a forceful blast of air hit his enlarged wrist, he dropped the girl in his enclosed hand as his limb shrunk back down to its normal size as Choji shook it up and down in agony. He looked at his forearm, at the spot he had been hit and saw the skin start to turn a light shade of violet under his sleeve as his damaged chakra point began to bruise the skin above it.
Shortly after he managed to regain focus and wrench it away from his wrist, Choji saw his attacker land on the ground delicately, almost as if she weighed the same amount as a feather, her feet perfectly positioned to keep her balance on landing, like a perfect gymnast. Shikamaru turned to see her Byakugan activated, the veins around her eyes pulsing as she took in every little detail of the surroundings, Choji stepped back away from her as her stare pierced through his large body, looking over each chakra point inside.
With Ino managing to scramble next to Choji the two of them went back-to-back, each facing Sasuke and Hinata respectively with kunai raised.
"Shikamaru!" Ino called to her teammate, who was shoulder to shoulder with Temari as they faced down Naruto, "You better have a plan!"
He turned to the Sand kunoichi next to him, "Do I have a plan?" he rhetorically asked his equal in a sarcastic tone before he turned back to Ino's glare.
"Ino connect all four of us now!" she wove her hand signs quickly after hearing his order.
"Okay can everyone hear me?" Shikamaru asked inside his head.
"Yep!"
"Uh huh!"
"Unfortunately" Shikamaru glanced over his shoulder at the grinning blonde behind him leaning on her fan.
"So what's the plan Shikamaru?"
"What we're gonna do is have you, Choji take on Naruto with your Expansion jutsu, try and get him further away from us okay?" He looked over at his teammate and gave him his best reassuring nod.
"Temari, you go take on Hinata, with your Wind style jutsu's long range you should be able to keep her at bay and stay out of the close range of her Gentle Fist technique" she nodded her head as she gritted her teeth, looking over at the rogue kunoichi.
"Ino, you stay out of sight and try and look for any openings to use your Mind Transfer jutsu, if it doesn't work then try your Mind Destruction jutsu, okay?"
"But what about Sasuke?"
"No worries, that's my problem to deal with" Shikamaru gave his comrades a sly smile as he drew his blade. The weapon itself was the same as the one his sensei Asuma Sarutobi used, one of his chakra blades, except it had been slightly modified per Shikamaru's request. The brass knuckled grip had been removed and replaced with a more ergonomic wrapped grip, much more preferable for Shikamaru, and the blade itself had been serrated for extra slashing damage, so the chakra blade that used to look like a trench knife now resembled more of a combat knife.
Shikamaru raised it, pointing the blade at Sasuke, "Let's go!" and the four shinobi charged their selected opponents.
"What the hell am I thinking? This is such a drag!" he thought as he faced off against the Uchiha, being careful not to look at his eyes. Sasuke was probably the worst opponent for Shikamaru, along with Naruto for the simple reason of the lack of data he had on him. There were only a few shinobi that Shikamaru believed he couldn't defeat with his eyes closed, Naruto, Sasuke and Kakashi were the best examples with all their unknown jutsu and ability to push their limits.
Shikamaru hadn't seen Sasuke fight for almost seven whole years, which gave the rogue shinobi the advantage of unpredictability. The Nara was aware of the majority of the Sharingan's powers; however, he was stumped by the introduction of the Mangekyou Sharingan as each individual's eyes' powers were unique. Along with the legendary Rinnegan, just the unknown data around Sasuke's visual prowess alone was enough to throw Shikamaru off his best game.
Shikamaru kissed his teeth as he felt a smile broaden on his face. He wasn't sure what was going on with himself, but he felt his breathing shorten as it quickened, his heart pounding against his ribs. His fingers twitched along with the rest of his muscles as they felt his oxygen filled blood pour into them.
All he felt in that moment was this feeling that he had only ever heard others describe, the same feeling Lee, Naruto, Neji and Kiba had described when they had come up against a strong opponent. This emotion could only ever be described as excitement.
The excitement of coming up against impossible odds and aiming to overcome them.
"And what are you grinning at?" Sasuke looked over Leaf shinobi.
"I'm just kinda excited to beat you Sasuke!" Shikamaru grinned.
The Uchiha raised his eyebrow at his declaration, clearly, he underestimated Shikamaru, something that the Nara was going to try and take advantage of. With all the blood pumping through his body, the genius felt his mind beginning to fire with sparks as an infinite number of possibilities raced around, taking all his skills of analysis to determine the best idea. After he'd picked his most likely to win tactic, Shikamaru wove his hand signs quickly.
This jutsu was one he had been working on these last two years, an improvement on the Nara clan's signature style. One of the many things he had to think about after the Fourth Great Ninja War and the lessons he learned in it was that he couldn't always rely on Ino and Choji being beside him and therefore he couldn't fall back on the Ino-Shika-Cho formation to be able to use to its fullest extent. With that in mind he decided to develop his Shadow Style hidden ninjutsu, and one of the glaringly obvious weaknesses it possessed was its immobilisation of the user. Along with the fact that it was a medium range ninjutsu, this specific weakness would make it extremely difficult to use in a one-on-one fight as it would need either the long-range support of ninjutsu, such as Temari's Wind style Tessenjutsu, or the close-range guard of taijutsu, like Choji's Expansion style taijutsu. So, in order to improve his own abilities and to make up for his lacking skill in close quarter combat, Shikamaru designed and created a new Shadow style ninjutsu, the Shadow style Shadow Skeleton jutsu.
Shikamaru felt his shadow start to creep up his legs as he finished his sequence of hand signs, his shadow tracing his body, all his limbs were covered down the centre by a dark shadow that followed the exact pattern of his bones. He grinned as he remembered how he always looked a little bit like Hidan when he used this jutsu, but it didn't matter to him anymore since he practically killed that arrogant asshole long ago.
Now ready to fight he didn't bother waiting for Sasuke to try and comprehend the sight before him. Shikamaru lunged forwards, his knife in a reverse grip slashing in a straight arc, aiming for Sasuke's right eye, the Sharingan itself.
One feature that really came in handy with this new jutsu of his, was that his physical prowess was pushed further, making Shikamaru a lot faster and stronger than most people in the Leaf Village and it came without the ridiculously gruelling training that Lee and Neji had to endure to achieve their speed and strength. With his radical enhancements, Shikamaru had focused on honing his ability with ninja tools, working with Tenten, the best ninja tool user in the Hidden Leaf Village, herself to improve his handling of his unique blade.
However, even with all these improvements, Shikamaru's blade was caught by Sasuke's sword before it got close enough to take out his eye.
"Well, this is new! This isn't really your style if I remember rightly" the rogue shinobi grinned at his opponent.
Shikamaru tried his best to mirror the Uchiha's expression, but he knew he had to conserve every little bit of energy where he could as his most powerful jutsu came with the obvious drawback of the massive chakra drainage on his already slightly above average chakra reserves. He felt the tug of his shadow's strength on his limbs as his wrist flicked away from Sasuke's sword, shooting towards his other eye, the Rinnegan.
Clang!
His attack was parried again by Sasuke, forcing Shikamaru to avoid the counterattack as he slithered under the diagonal swing of Sasuke's blade, ending up behind him. Not stopping to think, Shikamaru pivoted on his back foot immediately to go for the back of Sasuke's neck with his blade, only for Sasuke to disappear in an instant.
Shikamaru stood there stunned for a second, not knowing what was going on, until he heard the thud! of boots hitting the ground a few metres behind him. He instinctively dived down to his right, hearing the roaring flame blast past him, feeling his whole body bombarded with pure heat.
When he got back up, Shikamaru charged towards the oncoming Sasuke, their blades clashing in a pure melody of metal ringing against metal, each shinobi trying to gain the upper hand by using their free hands to grapple with the other or to try and form hand signs, every time being shut down by their opponent.
Shikamaru's genius was the only thing keeping him competitive in this fight against the prodigy that was Sasuke, as they both continuously analysed each other, searching for an opening that was always masked as quickly as it had appeared.
The fighting continued all around them, the sounds of heavy blows being traded by Choji and Naruto, the force of Temari's gales like a thunderstorm behind them, Ino and Temari's loud shouts at Hinata and her cold responses. The village continued to fall apart as it was demolished by the mixture of powerful jutsu that completely obliterated the land around.
Shikamaru believed that the four could carry on holding their own for a while longer now, until the scales tipped drastically.
Boom!
"Choji!" Shikamaru turned to see Ino's screaming face as Choji flew through the air away from a giant chakra explosion.
From what Shikamaru could tell within the few small moments he saw Choji's wounds, he guessed Naruto had used a Rasenshuriken aiming for Choji. It looked as if the Akimichi was fast enough to use his Partial Expansion jutsu on his arms and bring them to his chest, blocking the attack and taking the full force of such a powerful ninjutsu.
His body, however, couldn't take it, no matter how strong he was, Choji was no match for Naruto's infamous original jutsu. He hit the ground hard, skidding for more than a dozen metres as his clothes tore as they were ripped by the wind natured chakra from the ninjutsu of the same style. He came to a stop in the middle of the three different battles, his body broken and charred from the explosion, it didn't look as if Choji was dead, but he was definitely closer to it than he should be.
With Ino's guard now completely let down as she looked upon her comrade with a grief-stricken expression, Hinata took advantage and aimed for her with a pinpoint strike aimed at her back. Temari reacted quickly however, blasting Hinata with a powerful Wind style gust, pushing the Hyuga backwards and causing her to hit the ground after her feet were swept out from underneath her by the wind.
The only problem with saving Ino so unexpectedly, was that Temari was now left wide open to Naruto who lunged towards her aiming to grab her and take her as his hostage, knowing the advantage it would give him over Shikamaru.
The Nara was already way ahead of everyone, however, as his shadow connected to Temari's, and he had her dodge out of Naruto's reach with his Shadow Possession jutsu. The domino effect continued, with Sasuke taking his chance and aimed to cut off his opponent's head clean off his neck. Shikamaru knew he had to react as there would be no one who could save him but himself, and forcing his shadowy exoskeleton to tug his limbs, he whirled around to meet Sasuke.
In a flash, the two stood in place, locked in the other's grip. Their blades were raised to each other's jugular, Shikamaru's serrated steel digging in to Sasuke's throat, drawing a drop of crimson blood, Sasuke's Kusanagi blade mirroring the Nara's chakra blade.
They each had a firm grip on the other's armed wrist with their off hands, the only thing stopping either of them from having their throats slit open.
Now there was only an aura of complete silence between the two shinobi, as the embers of the burnt down buildings of the village crackled as they began to die out from the lack of fuel left, the sound of metal shaking as it tried to press deeper into the soft flesh of the ninja it aimed to kill.
That silence was only broken by the hearty chuckle that hid the demonic intentions behind the bright, shining fangs of the Nine-Tailed Fox's jinchuriki as he watched his two friends try and kill each other. Temari was left speechless as she watched the man who saved her little brother stand there and laugh at a fierce duel to the death, whilst Ino was crying and trying her best to help the almost unconscious Choji.
"See Sasuke?" He asked his comrade, "I told you! He's great, right?" The Uchiha smirked as he kept one eye on Shikamaru and focused the other on the man metres behind him.
"Yeah, I guess you were right" he smirked at his opponent, the man inches from ending his life, "He's pretty strong"
"Is this some kinda joke to you?" Shikamaru was starting to get pissed off at how the two of them were just chatting about him so nonchalantly.
"No! No Shikamaru! You've got it all wrong!" Shikamaru could only crane his neck a tad to catch Naruto's hands up in mock surrender out the corner of his eye whilst stopping Sasuke's sword from cutting further into his neck, "You see…" Naruto scratched the back of his head as he tried to explain, "Sasuke was just having a few doubts about your strength so—"
"I wanted to test your power out for myself" the rogue shinobi interrupted, grinning smugly at Shikamaru.
"So what's the point of all this then?" Shikamaru did his best to attempt to figure out what they were up to, "Why are you doing all this?"
"Because we want you to help us" Naruto stated proudly, his hands on his hips like a child showing off.
"I'm sorry…what!" Shikamaru's face contorted in confusion, "Why the fuck would I ever help you?"
"C'mon Shikamaru!" Naruto looked around frustrated, "You should know by now that the Hidden Leaf Village has no chance against us anyways! But with your help it'll be a lot easier to achieve our goal"
Shikamaru couldn't help but fall into the trap of his own creation, his mind exploring every possible outcome of the life-altering choice he was presented with. He thought about the state of the village these last two years, how intense the workload had been for every shinobi from the ranks of jonin to genin, let alone all the work that was forced on Kakashi and Lady Tsunade with all the pressure from the other four Kage. His mind drifted to the promise he'd made himself years ago now, to protect the king. His mind blew open with all the possibilities to help the Hidden Leaf Village and to save it from total destruction, "I can reduce the damage and lower the number of casualties this way" he told himself. Certain people drifted to the forefront of his crowded thoughts as he tried to reassure himself of the decision he was about to go through with. His mother ,Yoshino, all his friends, Kurenai and her daughter Mirai, the child he had promised his sensei he would protect, and one figure stood out amongst the others, the girl from his dream, his angel.
"Shikamaru!" Temari shouted towards him from her position on her knees as she tried to get up from where he had dragged her to earlier with his jutsu, "Don't you dare—" She was interrupted by the pressure of the sword that now rested on her shoulder, pressing gently against her throat, the same blade that used to be against Shikamaru's. He turned around to see Sasuke had disappeared from their deadlock and was now standing over the Sand kunoichi.
"Fuck… This is such a drag!" He looked up at the clouds in disbelief at what he was about to say. Climbing Silver. Those two words floated around his head as he shook it, trying to figure out how he had ended up being the sacrificial pawn, and he couldn't believe that the sacrifice for the king wouldn't actually cost him his life, but his friends, family and probably… his humanity.
He looked back towards Naruto and Sasuke who had been joined by Hinata as they watched him, waiting for an answer.
"Okay you got me!" Shikamaru huffed as he raised his hands, sheathing his chakra blade. He looked over the faces of the group he was about to join, Sasuke had on his signature victorious smirk like a smug prick, Naruto's face widened into his infamous, mischievous grin whilst Hinata looked over Ino and Temari as she licked her lips with excitement. One thing that Shikamaru couldn't take was the expressions of his comrades. Ino was in tears already, so her puffy eyes welled up again as she wailed over Choji's fading consciousness, the severely injured Akimichi tried his best to look at his oldest friend, but his body wouldn't allow as he slowly became delirious with the intense pain he was in.
What almost made his heart shatter, however, was the confused and disappointed expression of Temari as her eyes looked like they were far away in thought as she stared at him with worry, terrified of what he had just said. Shikamaru couldn't bear it, but he had an idea that he thought could work. His eyes widened as the pain of her disappointment carved its way onto his heart, the Nara was desperate to do something anything to stop the pain.
"Te-Temari" he stuttered as he put all his energy into the hope that this would work, "Come with me!"
As Shikamaru stood there vulnerable, Temari's heartbroken expression was quickly replaced with a demonic demeanour when his words reached her ears.
"What did you just say?" She asked rhetorically asked as she got up and headed towards him. Sasuke moved to stop her but felt a tight grip on his wrist as Naruto pushed his sword arm away from the Sand kunoichi, letting her go to the Leaf shinobi.
Slap!
Shikamaru's cheek reddened as he recoiled from her brute strength, spitting blood onto the dirt. He looked back at Temari, seeing her teal eyes well up as they threatened to burst into tears.
"How could you ask me something like that Shikamaru?"
"Temari please just hear me out!" he pleaded to the girl.
Once she eventually nodded, Shikamaru explained his reasoning for doing what he was about to do, telling her his plan to reduce the casualties and to make sure he stops Naruto from going overboard and massacring all those Shikamaru had promised to protect. He asked the Sand kunoichi to help him with his plan, knowing that she would be the most reliable person for him to enable his plan to protect everyone.
Her face showed her reluctance to his crazy ideas, but her eyes gave away her desire to trust him. His soft, warm almond eyes met her scared teal pupils, pleading her to help him, desperate for her help.
Temari gave an audible gulp as she prepared herself for what she was about to do, thinking of her brothers back home, hoping they'd be okay without her.
"O-Okay"
The two turned around to tell Naruto, Hinata and Sasuke their decision. The two guys looked at each other, raising their eyebrows at the idea of having an extra member than they had planned. They finally shrugged as they decided it would be okay if it meant Shikamaru would help them.
"Then let's go!" Naruto exclaimed, moving away.
He was stopped by Sasuke's blade across his chest, pointing towards the two remaining Leaf shinobi.
"What about them?" Naruto asked curiously, turning towards his friend.
"They could be… annoying to leave alive" Sasuke looked back at Naruto with a dangerous glare.
Ino's face dropped in terror as she covered Choji, doing her best to guard him. Shikamaru stared at Sasuke, trying to figure out another plan to save his friends. The tense atmosphere continued for seconds, that felt like entire minutes, with Naruto and Shikamaru staring at Sasuke whilst he glared at Ino who's eyes were wide with fear.
As Shikamaru's mind came to the best solution for this mess he was now in, he hoped that Ino would forgive him for what he was about to say but also hoping for her gratitude for the chance he was giving her to see her best friend again, hoping to cheer her up from the pain she'd been in ever since the pink haired kunoichi was taken.
"We take her with us too" Shikamaru stared off against Sasuke, "I'm sure we can find a use for her" he gave a sly grin to try and give off an air of false confidence. He saw Ino look between the three guys as they all gave off their own dominating presences, Naruto's aura of unpredictability, Sasuke's hateful atmosphere and Shikamaru's air of genius all clashed together as they fought for complete control over the situation.
What broke the tension between them was Hinata, looking up at Naruto with a hopeful, pleading look in her eye as she kept Ino in view, licking her lips and clapping her hands together excitedly. Naruto shrugged before he nodded his agreeance with Shikamaru, much to Sasuke's moody dismay.
"W-wait! I can't just leave Choji!" Ino shouted as she looked around to see everyone focused on her after they made their decision of what to do with her inferior life.
"He'll probably die soon anyways so it doesn't matter" Sasuke proclaimed making the girl continue her screaming as she tried to protect the Akimichi.
Shikamaru motioned to Hinata for her to knock out the blonde via the chakra point in her neck and as the kunoichi slumped forward, now unconscious, Shikamaru moved forwards to catch her.
"Okay, now let's get going!" Naruto waved his arms impatiently.
"One sec!" Shikamaru popped a cigarette into his mouth, "Just let me light it" he carried on lighting it. He picked up Ino in his arms and gestured to leave, giving Temari a look, hoping that she knew what he was trying to do.
When Naruto, Sasuke and Hinata took off, Shikamaru dropped his lit cigarette next to Choji.
"I'm sorry Choji" Temari used a small Wind style jutsu to blow the smoke upwards in the air.
The two of them, with Ino unconscious in Shikamaru's arms followed their new comrades.
A/N- So how was it? What did you think of it? I'm also gonna apologise because I think the next two weeks might be slower on uploads so I hope you'll be patient with me because I plan on this being a long story anyways. Another thing I'd love to get your help with is deciding who Ino should be with because I already have one vote for Naruto, but I also came into this story with the idea of having her being apart of another guy's harem. So let me know who out of the three guys in the Akatsuki now, you'd want Ino to be with? Or maybe all of them I don't know! Anyways, sorry for the long author's note and I should see you next week!
Yours truly,
Signing off.