Wow, thanks for all the reviews. I'm glad that people seem to like this so far, especially since this is my first attempt with this pairing, and the first multi-chapter story that I've written in a while. If anyone has some ideas/suggestions/criticism so that I can make this story better, I'd really appreciate it. I already have the plot as a whole planned out, but I'm always willing to listen to suggestions, as long as it doesn't contradict the plot.

In other news, this chapter reveals the side pairing I'm using. Did I forget to mention there was a side pairing? Oops, sorry! I did kind of want it to be a surprise, which is why I didn't mention it up till now. Hope that it's okay, and I'll update the summary to reflect it when I post the next chapter. Anyways, read on.

Chases are Troublesome

While there were many things that annoyed Nara Shikamaru a great deal, three things in particular really grated him. He hated putting effort into things, because he thought that most things that people thought effort should be put into (school, chores, bills, etc.) really weren't that important in the grand scheme of things, so it was better to preserve energy for what really mattered in life. He hated aggressive women, mostly because they reminded him of his mother, who in his mind was frightening enough to make the Akatsuki wet their pants. He hated life-or-death situations, influenced by the results of the mission to retrieve Sasuke three years ago and more recently seeing his former sensei die, both of which had been coupled by a feeling of inadequacy for his own abilities as a leader and fighter.

Currently, he was running as fast as his legs would allow down a back street from several very aggressive and competitive women, most of whom were well-versed in the arts of assassination.

Obviously, Shikamaru was having a very bad day.

Shikamaru really had no idea what he had done to get all these girls to suddenly like him. He had carefully crafted his image into that of a lazy good-for-nothing so that he could get out of being given any serious work or missions to do. If he had to lay blame, it would be on the chunnin exams three years ago. Somehow, he had actually gotten in the mood to take his match seriously, and had revealed that he actually could fight. It probably didn't help that he was the only member of the retrieval team later that year that had returned to the village standing. Shikamaru wasn't a vain person, but he did allow himself to admit he wasn't unappealing to look at, so if he had looks, smarts, and strength, he supposed that the girls that used to chase Sasuke around would find something that they liked in him.

The main problem—other than the fact that these women would probably literally be the death of him—was that they were all as aggressive as his mother was. Shikamaru didn't have much, if any aspirations for the future. He planned on simply paying his bills, marrying some girl, having kids and generally living out his life in sheer uneventful bliss. The one thing that he was determined to see through in his life, however, was that he not get caught in the same situation that his father was in, at the eternal beck and call of his wife. And that's exactly what would happen if he actually wound up with one of these crazy girls. Especially the two front runners, who were also the most demanding females he had ever met.

To be clear, he didn't hate either of them. Shikamaru had grown up with Ino due to their fathers' friendship, and Temari's personality wasn't so bad, especially compared to her brothers and other Suna shinobi he had met. He also respected their strength, both of them having saved his life before. Still, he only saw them as allies and companions; nothing more than that, and a possible attraction that he might have felt to either one of them was lost once they had starting fighting over him. Seriously, how could anyone think that this kind of cat fighting was attractive?

Besides, he didn't care much for blond hair and blue eyes anyways.

"Umm, Shikamaru? Do you think that we could—?" Shikamaru gave the brown-eyed redhead that had caught up with him no time to finish her request as he quickly ran into the crowded main street and veered to the right. Damn, he had been so absorbed in his thoughts that he had allowed the throng of females to catch up to him. He had managed to slip away from Ino and Temari earlier in front of Ichiraku while they lost their focus on him to start staring down each other. Thankfully, Sakura had remained silent as he tried to escape, but before he could round the corner, another girl—Ami, he thought her name was—saw him and immediately started squealing. This, of course, managed to grab the two warring blondes' attention, and Shikamaru had taken off like a rocket, picking up more and more followers/stalkers as he ran.

Now, Shikamaru was zigzagging through the crowded marketplace. Maybe he could manage to at least shake a few of them. He dashed through the crowd and past vendors, apologizing as he brushed up against people. He was almost amused as some of the shoppers and salesmen watched as the infamous slacker danced among the busy street as fast as he could. Eventually, he escaped the marketplace, and turned around to see if he had lost any of his pursuers. His jaw slacked when he found that, not only had he lost absolutely none of the girls, the group was actually larger than it was before. Damn mob mentality!

Shikamaru picked up speed again, becoming more frustrated with the day each passing second. He wasn't even supposed to be here right now. He was supposed to be hanging out with Chouji and watching the clouds today. That was another thing making this whole situation even more troublesome. Thanks to the near-constant attention he was now receiving, he hadn't been able to spend time with his best friend in weeks. He couldn't even remember the last time they had been able to go cloud watching. The only time they could have some time together anymore was on missions, and Shikamaru couldn't give up his concentration during those, lest anyone on his team get injured, or worse.

Shikamaru felt horrible for how he was treating his friend, even if it wasn't his own fault. Sure, Chouji wasn't nearly as thin skinned about this kind of thing as he was when they were younger, but he was still basically being abandoned. Whenever they did get the chance to talk, Shikamaru could tell that, even if he understood, Chouji was really hurting from being left alone. Chouji really didn't deserve to feel that lonely, and Shikamaru felt incredibly guilty for it. No matter how innocent he was in the whole affair, the shadow ninja couldn't deny that he was basically the cause of his friend's pains.

Shikamaru once again pulled himself out of his thoughts and glanced around. This whole chase had gone on long enough, and he needed to find a way to end it. He spotted an alley off the side of the road, and realized that it was actually one that he often used walking to and from Lady Hokage's office. A flash of an idea came to him, and he glanced at the crowd behind him. Maybe that mob mentality could work in his favor. If only he could get out of their sights for just a second…

The girls saw Shikamaru dart into the alley, and followed after him as fast as they could. Most of them were already slightly tired out from all of the yelling they had done during the chase to try and get Shikamaru's attention. Once inside, however, they found that the alley split into two paths, and Shikamaru was nowhere to be seen. After a few seconds of confusion and murmuring, Ami suddenly cried out and pointed down the path to the left. The mob quickly looked and caught a fleeting glance of Shikamaru's shadow as he ran back out into the busy public streets, and quickly moved to catch up with him.

Ino, however, stayed behind, looking around cautiously. If there was one thing that she had learned over the years as a member of Team 10, it was that, when it came to Shikamaru, shadows were not to be trusted. She noticed that Temari had also remained, apparently realizing the same thing that the younger girl had. After a moment, their suspicions were confirmed as they saw their target leap across the rooftops overhead, in the opposite direction of where the mob went. Both girls smirked as they jumped up to continue their pursuit. Now, with that whole hoard gone, there was a chance for some…intimate…time with the boy.

Shikamaru groaned as he looked back. He had managed to get rid of most of the girls, but he would have liked it if at least one of the two blondes that were still after him had been lost as well. He hoped that, now that the two rivals were the only ones there, they might focus more on fighting each other than doing who-knows-what to him. Still, he knew better than to just leave it to hope, and began to look for another way to lose them.

After another minute of searching and ignoring/cringing at the catcalls he was receiving from the kunoichi, he finally found his chance. He was nearing a run-down apartment complex on the seedier sides of town (as seedy as Kohonagakure got, anyways). It was public knowledge that the building was poorly kept and on it's last legs, and that quite literally no one lived in the place. To Shikamaru, however, that meant four floors with six apartments each of places to hide himself until he could sneak away from Ino and Temari. Sure, they were in hot pursuit right now, but get them to slow down, and they'd be at each other's throats again, and he'd be free to go unnoticed.

Shikamaru put another burst of speed into his run and dashed towards the building, once again out of view of the dueling blondes for just a second. It didn't matter which door he chose—all the apartments were vacant, after all—so he jumped onto the third floor, since that was closest to his current elevation. He went for the closest door, the second from the end of the walkway, and immediately turned the knob so that he could slip inside before Ino and Temari caught up again.

It was locked.

Shikamaru's eyes went wide in panic. How could the door be locked? No one lived here. He continued to fiddle with the knob, praying that it was just stuck or something. The door didn't give. Shikamaru didn't have time for this. Any second and—

"SHIKAMARU!"

The poor boy turned around to the familiar twin cries just in time to see Ino and Temari tackle him. All three of them crashed into the door, and while it may have been able to stand Shikamaru's frantic fiddling, the wooden portal could not stand the full body force of all three young shinobi. It almost immediately swung open, and the brunette and two blondes landed unceremoniously on the floor of the apartment.

After the few initial groans of pain, Shikamaru looked around the flat he had tried so hard to enter earlier, and deadpanned once he saw it, the girls quickly following suit. At least now he knew why the door was locked.

Inside, the only piece of furniture was the futon in the middle of the floor. On the futon were several new sheets that shouldn't have been in an empty apartment. On top of those sheets rested a very flushed, very naked Uzumaki Naruto, and on top him was an equally nude Inuzuka Kiba. Who knows what they were doing just before they were barged in on, but now they were gawking in shock at the three intruders that had tumbled in.

Silence reigned in the room for a moment. Followed by screams.

Yeah, this was definitely a bad day.

A/N: 'sigh' It's a universal truth. If it's a Naruto fan fiction, and I write it, then it's going to have KibaNaru in it. Sorry, but I just can't help myself. In my own defense, I did kind of hint at it, what with both of them having to "be somewhere" at the same time and all. Hopefully, putting in another pairing to go with ShikaCho won't turn off anyone, but this event is kind of necessary for the later chapters. You'll see what I mean soon.

That being said, I need some help with the next chapter. I need a sort of line that could be seen as homophobic without really meaning to, like an offhand comment that would make a gay person feel bad overhearing it, without the speaker actually being homophobic. Kind of how people will insult each other by calling them "gay" without actually disliking gay people. I can't explain any more than that without giving the plot of Chapter 4 away, so sorry if this is a little vague. I'm actually kind of worried that I gave too much away already. If you have any suggestions, please PM them to me. Don't put it in a review, because if I use it, I don't want others to see it before the chapter comes out. Once again, I'm probably giving too much away, but I've been racking my brain to come up with what I need, and I've got nothing. Thank you in advance.