Shikamaru Versus the Impact Bias: Part 2

Ino ran over to where Raidou was staring down Hidon. She whispered in his ear. He looked over at Shikamaru sharply.

"I don't know, that seems a bit-Insane."

Ino only nodded vigorously.

Raidou shrugged and performed a Bunshin. His clone raced towards a figure on a building nearby with his hands held high in control of the raven Jutsu. Shikamaru was including him too of course. It was obvious that the ravens had to have come from somewhere, when he had time to think about it. Including Aoba was only natural.

Hidon frowned. As the four shinobi approached him. The Bunshin of Raidou sped up the side of the building and said something to Aoba in the distance.

The ravens suddenly backed off, flying well over Hidon's head, and maintaining a flying pattern there, forming what looked like a ceiling of swirling black feathers.

Hidon made a show of sighing.

"What is it this time? What could you possibly want from me?"

"Guess," said Shikamaru.

"Don't tell me you think you can save your weak ass teacher? My immortality is MINE, asshole. Dumbass heathens like you can't just take it from me."

Shikamaru only smirked at him as the four of them began encircling where Hidon stood. He'd managed to get his scythe back.

"Why can't you fight me straight up? You Konoha shinobi are like rats."

"Eek eek." Shikamaru said.

Choji suddenly stepped in front of Shikamaru and flung a kunai with an explosive note at Hidon.

"I bet you'll dodge this time." Shikamaru's voice taunted from behind Choji.

Hidon bent backwards to dodge.

Ino tossed a handful of kunai with explosive notes at him low in his new position.

He smirked and leapt sideways, twirling in a leap parallel to the ground to avoid them.

As soon as he was nearing a landing, a black sword struck at him from behind. Hidon turned his head and noticed the attack while he was reaching out with his feet to land. He swung his scythe in mid twirl, parrying the blow over his head while he craned his neck way back to track the attack.

He landed with both knees bent and one hand supporting his landing on the ground. His hand wielding the scythe enveloped the black sword, swinging it free. He spun instantly upon landing, orienting on Raidou.

"IS THAT ALL YOU GOT?!" Shrieked Hidon.

A shadow shot along the ground toward his position.

"Oh give me a break already!" Hidon shouted.

He leapt out of the way, streaking right towards Raidou and lashing out at the defenseless Jonin with his scythe.

"Goodbye, rat!" Hidon said as his scythe reached out to finish him.

The Jonin just stood there, the scar on his face crinkling as he looked up at Hidon and smiled.

"Why are you smiling?-"

A shadow fell over both of them.

The angle Raidou was looking at was a bit over Hidon's shoulder.

Hidon frowned at Raidou's lack of dodge attempt and seemed to realize something was up.

His scythe hit Raidou right in the stomach.

He disappeared, the second Bunshin prepared secretly in the first summoning vanishing in smoke.

Hidon looked over his shoulder.

A giant fist shot down through a small hole in the screening ravens, and slammed into Hidon's midsection, pinning both of his arms together and slamming him into the ground violently.

His scythe spun and clattered a few feet away and pulverized rock dust sprang up in a cloud.

The kunai with bits of fake explosive notes tied to them clattered off buildings nearby where they fell down stairs.

"Ino!" Shikamaru said urgently.

"Got it!" She responded and took out a summoning scroll.

A half dozen hypodermic needles appeared in a puff of summoning smoke.

The rock debris cleared and Choji stood just in front of Hidon, holding him down with one giant fist.

"Hurry!" he shouted.

Hidon screamed and squirmed around; cursing death threats at all the loyal rats of Konoha.

Meanwhile Shikamaru and the real Raidou leapt forward and jammed a hypodermic needle each into the obvious vein in his tattered pants.

"What are you rats doing?! GRAHH!" He struggled and squirmed, but Choji barely managed to keep hold.

"Hey wow, looks like we can take your immortality after all!" Shikamaru said conversationally, holding up the full needle of blood.

"My blood? You assholes took my BLOOD!"

He let out a feral scream and began thrashing around.

Shikamaru looked over at Ino "Shikamaru!" Choji yelled as one of his fingers jerked free under Hidon's bid for freedom.

"Don't let him touch you Choji! We're almost done!"

"Right!"

Shikamaru glanced over at Ino who hadn't used her needle yet.

He gaped at her in horror.

"Ino! What the HELL are you doing?"

She was tapping the end of the water-filled needle, looking at it critically.

She looked at him defensively.

"Hey it's standard procedure, if I don't tap out all the bubbles it might-"

"Yeah, you might accidentally put an air bubble into his bloodstream. He might even DIE!" Shikamaru shouted at her sarcastically. "That would be a tragedy Ino!"

Her mouth formed a little "O" and then she stabbed the needle into his leg, drawing up a full blood.

Three needles full. It should be enough.

Another two fingers lost hold on Hidon and he began shimmying free, biting at Choji in lieu of his scythe.

"Good job Choji!" Shikamaru shouted. "Now get out of there!"

"Got it!" He said, and his arm disappeared in a cloud of smoke as he leapt backwards, normal sized again.

"BLASPHEMY!" Hidon was screaming from his little crater n the ground. "You assholes think you're worthy? You took my blood?! That's sacred you assholes! It's fucking holy!"

Raidou kept a watchful eye on Hidon where he was painfully trying to extricate himself from his rocky crater. There were a few sharp rocks protruding from his limbs. The crows shot down again, pecking at his eyes.

"You'll burn for this!" Hidon screamed. "Lord Jashin would never accept that weakass master of yours!"

Shikamaru and Ino landed beside Asuma, their hands carrying the collected needles full of Hidon's blood.

"...too…reckless..." Asuma said.

Shikamaru was about to unleash a witty rejoinder when Asuma-

Stopped breathing.

His eyes stared out, unblinking.

No. He couldn't be dead. No way.

"INO!" Shikamaru screamed.

She grabbed the needle from him and jammed all three through Asuma's breast plate, injecting the immortal's blood directly into his heart.

Nothing happened.

Come ON, Shikamaru thought.

Seconds passed.

"Shikamaru-" Ino said. "I think maybe it's time to-"

"Just wait. Please."

The three of them sat there bent over Asuma, waiting.

But there was nothing.

Nothing!

Come on Asuma, come on.

Meanwhile, Hidon was continuing to cackle madly as he was inundated with ravens.

"You're all a bunch of dead men! No, more than that?! By the time this is over, your master will wish he was dead! Just wait! You just wait, you'll see!"

Just then a stray raven flew into his mouth and Hidon spent the next few moments spitting out black feathers.

Shikamaru had his head turned in that direction when he heard the distinctive sound of someone seizing a lungful of air.

He snapped his head back around immediately and saw Asuma's body arching painfully up from the ground, as if his muscles were spasming. It looked like some giant, invisible creature was puling at his rib cage.

"Sensei!" Ino said. "Are you-"

Asuma swiveled his head to look in Shikamaru's direction. There was a look of pure shock and horror on his face.

"What are you?" Asuma demanded.

Shikamaru froze in surprise, like a frightened deer.

And before anyone could say anything else, Asuma gasped and his body flopped to the ground, lifeless once more.

Ino immediately put a finger to his neck, taking his pulse.

"Is he-"Choji said, trailing off.

"His pulse-" Ino began.

Shikamaru knew he should be paying attention to what was going on with Asuma, and he was but- he also couldn't get his mind off of what Asuma had said to him. What had he meant? Did he think that Shikamaru's obsession with saving him over completing the mission made him a monster?

"-it's different," Ino finished.

"Different than what?" Choji said, tense.

She hesitated.

"Different than before," She looked down at the needles in her hands, "everything."

"In what way?" Shikamaru heard himself say, surprisingly calm.

"His pulse was racing before, but getting weaker all the time. But now it's… steady. But weak."

Kabuto's voice suddenly crackled to life from Shikamaru's shoulder. He jumped a little, having forgotten all about it.

Kabuto asked Ino a few short questions about Captain Asuma's heartbeat measurements, which she answered after taking a moment to make sure.

"Based on what I'm hearing, it sounds like he may be slipping into a coma. I recommend expediting his return to base."

Shikamaru took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

Asuma was alive. He had to focus on that.

The fact that he was slipping into a coma, that they had no idea why he was going into a coma, or what exactly Hidon's blood had done to him that would "make him wish he were dead" according to Hidon, and that he apparently thought Shikamaru was a monster were all beside the point.

Shikamaru watched the faint rustle of dirt in front of Asuma from his breath.

Alive.

Shikamaru clung to that truth. Nothing else mattered.

Captain Asuma was still alive.

It was OK now. He could work with that.

Shikamaru took a deep breath, letting out tension he had kept in for what seemed like hours now.

He had done it.

They had done it.

He let out his long breath, letting himself be happy with the accomplishment.

It was right then that he felt a cold breath on the back of his neck.

The scent of burnt flesh was in the air

"I want to thank you," a deep, rumbling voice said, right over his right shoulder.

Shikamaru froze in place.

He really needed to learn how to stop doing that.

You know, assuming he didn't get pulverized first.

After all, not being pulverized was a prerequisite for well, anything else really.

"I admit that I have had trouble keeping up with modern inventions of civilians. I see now that was a serious mistake. I may need to reconsider killing you."

Finally Shikamaru was able to turn around and slowly back off from Kakuzu.

He stood there calmly, as if there wasn't a giant burnt hole in his chest from where the electric power line had hit him.

What gives? Do all Akatsuki members get immortality as a perk?

Of course, Hidon immediately started yelling.

"Kakuzu! Where the hell have you been? While you were taking your sweet-"

He paused then.

"Wow! What the hell happened to you?"

"I fought a surprisingly clever rat," Kakuzu said, smirking.

Hidon barked out a laugh and pulled himself out of the crater in the ground.

"I know, right? Seriously."

He stretched his limbs a few times, and then scooped up where his scythe had fallen, and casually walked over to where Kakuzu was standing a few feet away from Shikamaru.

The backup team tensed, watching every step Hidon made. It was like everyone was holding their breath.

After what just happened, Shikamaru couldn't imagine any scenarios that actually ended with their victory. After all, they didn't have extra lives like the Akatsuki members did. Seriously, how did you survive being electrocuted directly in the chest?

"Come on Kakuzu; let's kill them now, finally!"

Kakuzu stood there staring at Shikamaru for what seemed like an eternity. For long seconds he said nothing.

Then, without changing any other expression on his face at all-

He curled his lips into a smile.

Shikamaru waited to feel a fist the hardness of a rock impact with the side of his face, knowing that there was no way he could do anything about it, drained as he was.

"No," Kakuzu said finally.

"What?!" Hidon said.

"They STOLE my BLOOD! I can't let them live! It's blasphemy Kakuzu!"

"Like I care about your pointless religion," Kakuzu said.

He didn't take his eyes off of Shikamaru.

"Besides, I cannot allow that one to die. Not until we extract from him all he knows about these new civilian…tools."

"Like I care about that Kakuzu! They have to-"

"Shut up," Kakuzu said, turning to look at him. "I know you heard it. The summons."

Hidon adopted n expression of fake innocence. "Message? I didn't hear-"

"You heard it." Kakuzu said firmly.

Hidon slashed his hand through the air.

"Big deal," he said. "They can totally wait just-"

"We're going," Kakuzu said firmly.

"God damnit!" Hidon shouted. He pointed at Shikamaru with one hand.

"We're not done! You better fucking wait right there you goddamn…"

He thought about it for a moment.

He brightened

"Cheaters!" He called out, just as Kakuzu made hand signs and they disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

Shikamaru took a deep breath and stared at the dissipating smoke from the escape Jutsu. He let his mind wander for just a moment, like relaxing a muscle that had been flexed for a bit too long. The shape of the smoke was nice; it was like the calm shape of clouds.

"What a massive pain in the ass," Shikamaru said, right about the time that everyone began asking him questions all at the same time.

"Coma," Kabuto said, before Shikamaru could say a single word.

Choji and the other Chuunin laid Asuma down on the medical table as Kabuto began hooking Asuma up to an IV and monitoring equipment.

Shikamaru wanted to say something witty about Kabuto's magic ability to make detailed diagnoses within 3 seconds of seeing a patient, but all he managed was-

"Oh."

Shikamaru's face must've recovered it's skeptical look pretty fast because Kabuto immediately put up his hands in contrition and said-

"OK, OK, put him on the table and I'll check it officially, but I've seen this a hundred times. I mean just look at-"

Shikamaru's brain shut out the inevitable medical language automatically. A defense mechanism probably. Kabuto hated being wrong way too much to actually say something like that without being certain of it.

Logically he should withhold judgment before coming to any conclusions but he couldn't help it, his brain was already trying to deal with it.

And that's right about when Kurenai came in, and Shikamaru finished putting down Asuma with the others.

All he could manage was a weak bow and apology to Kurenai before he fled the room.

Shikamaru looked at the remains of the Shougi board all around him. His father, Shikaku regarded his outburst calmly.

"But what am I going to do?" Shikamaru said finally. There were tears in his eyes. His father pretended not to notice.

"Asuma- because of me he might-"

Shikaku gripped him gently but firmly by the shoulders, turning him so they were face to face.

"You're my blood." He said simply. "You're smart. You may even be smarter than me, someday. If there's a solution, you'll find it. But only if you think." He tapped him lightly on the forehead with a finger.

Shikamaru sat back, wiping his streaming eyes with a sleeve, trying to calm down, trying to think. Suddenly something pulled at his mind, something his Dad had said. You're my blood. He'd said.

Blood. The crux of Hidon's power.

And just like that he had it.

Shikamaru stood up, his eyes widening in realization, his chair clattering to the floor behind him...

"It goes both ways!" he said. "I'm your blood, and your mine." He told his dad.

Shikaku smiled, took a drink of tea. The smile tugged lightly on the scar that went up past his eye.

"What you say is true. You have an idea?" He said, mildly.

"I have to go." Shikamaru said, turning on his heel and tearing out of the house.

It was wild. It would depend on a few different things working out, the first of which was permission from the Hokage, and the second of which was the trust of a certain group of people.

It could work, Shikamaru thought. It could work.

He could catch Hidon.

He could save Asuma.

"You're kidding right?" Shikamaru said in an even voice. "Of course I'm going to go after him; he put Asuma-sensei in a damn coma. And he's still out there."

Lady Tsunade regarded him coolly.

"Shikamaru, I know you want revenge but-"

Shikamaru raised an eyebrow.

"Revenge? Oh, right. I do want payback yes, but that's not the point."

Lady Tsunade frowned. "Not the point?"

Shikamaru took a deep breath. There was no point in calling her a massive idiot. It would be counterproductive and indulgent.

Even if she totally was.

Tsunade leaned forward and steepled her fingers. Finally, she said-"I still say you're letting this go to your head. You might say it's actually for noble reasons but really-"

"I still say you're letting this go to your head. You might say it's actually for noble reasons but really-"

"Justification Bias, yes I know."

"What?"

"Justification Bias- I want to do something for X reason, but I say it's for Y reason because Y reason seems more reasonable. Like how I say I'm doing this for the good of all of Konoha but how you think I really just want revenge."

Tsunade decided to simply lift one eyebrow.

"Ok fine, that may be the case- but so? The point is that the reasons I'm going to give still apply- justification bias is moot as long as you're aware of it and you actually still have a good reason for doing it."

"Shikamaru," Tsunade said, getting up, "I think it's more than that. You're mad. Your judgment is skewed. You think that you have to solve this right now, because you're so mad, when really-"

"You're accusing me of an emotional bias. The impact bias. The idea that I'm letting the impact of my current emotional state affect my judgment."

Tsunade continued to frown at him.

"See, researchers at Fire University discovered that when emotional events occur, such as the loss of a loved one, individuals were very poor at understanding how that event would impact them in the long term. This causes them to make bad decisions based on these bad predictions. In this case, the impact bias might make me think that my grief at Asuma's death or satisfaction at his revenge will last much longer than it actually will."

"But, that's not what you're doing," Tsunade said flatly. "Making a long term decision based on a shorter term emotional impact."

Shikamaru found himself gritting his teeth.

"We just witnessed an immortal. He can't die. Even if you cut off his head. Do you really think I'd be stupid and puerile enough to just blow him up and leave his body parts in a ditch somewhere? My mission is probably the most important mission ever attempted in the history of humanity. If I can capture a live immortal and deliver him to our lab, it will be the biggest scientific wet dream imaginable. Imagine if we can reverse engineer him? Figure out how he works? Revenge for revenge's sake is a massive waste of time. Sure I'd remove him as a threat and plus wow, I would feel better? But so what? I think I'd feel a lot better actually, if we turned this defeat into the biggest victory Konoha has ever seen."

Shikamaru delivered all this while calm and unblinking with his hands spread out before him and the fingertips touching.

Tsusnade blinked. "But that's-" She paused. She opened her mouth to say something, and Shikamaru could tell from her micro-expressions that she was irritated and it would likely be another philosophical argument. He opened his own mouth to counter her, but then she made an "Hmm" noise and he stopped.

Tsunade shook her head, her blonde tails flapping back and forth.

"OK" She said slowly. "But why did you say all that about them putting Asuma into a coma if you didn't mean you wanted revenge?"

"Well, just because I don't believe in revenge for revenge's sake, doesn't mean I don't have a sense of fair play." Shikamaru said with a wicked grin. "I figure, Hidon put him into a coma, so Hidon is going to bring him back."