A/N: Hello again! Huge thanks to everyone who reviewed/favorited/followed my story, and special thanks to brizamartian and sylversmith. I can't believe how much easier it is to write something when you know people actually want to read it.

And another thing: it came to my attention that in the last chapter, there were no line breaks between POV shifts. I apologize for that—I seriously have no idea why they didn't transfer from the original document, and I can understand how the lack of division could be a bit disorienting, to say the least. Well, this is only my second story and I'm still kind of figuring out the system, so let's hope it works this time…

"I realize the screaming pain / Hearing loud in my brain / But I'm going straight ahead with this scar."

—Sign (FLOW)

Chapter 2: The Aftermath

The first thing Shikamaru noticed when he awoke was that it was the middle of the night. Then he realized several things simultaneously: he was moving, he was inside the Hidden Sand's outer wall, and he was in a tremendous amount of pain.

"Oh good, you're conscious," he heard. The voice echoed strangely inside his skull, banging around and not really making any sense. He tried to turn his head to find the source of the noise, but damn it hurt to move.

"Wha—" he broke off, unwilling to let his voice shake as he cringed. He decided it would be a better idea to simply let his eyes roam, and he glanced around frantically until his sights landed on a familiar figure nearby. He was still bleary-eyed and on the brink of unconsciousness, but there was no way he could mistake that hair.

"'Mari. Wha' happ'ned?" He was dismayed to hear the slur in his words, to feel the heaviness in his tongue. He couldn't stand sounding weak, no matter how extenuating the circumstances.

"You almost got your stupid ass killed. That's what happened," she responded hotly.

The disapproval in her voice weighed down on him and made his head hurt even more than he'd thought possible, but he persevered. There were things he needed to know.

"Di' we win?"

"Yes, Nara. We won. Any more questions?"

"How's ev'ryone else? How're my frien's?"

It was probably just the droopy-eyed state he was in, but Temari's eyes started to look especially sparkly in the moon's lazy glow. She turned her head away from him, and he could have sworn that he heard her voice waver when she finally answered.

"Not good, Nara. Not good."

Temari would have slapped herself if she'd had the energy. Of all times to start crying, this was one of the worst she could imagine. If Shikamaru were a little more aware of his surroundings at present, she was sure he'd be mocking her, just as she'd done to him in the past.

Or maybe that was thinking too much of him. More likely, he'd have cried right alongside her.

But there was no point in speculating; there were much more important things to worry about. She found herself dragged into her own thoughts by Shikamaru's question. She didn't want to think about how their comrades were doing, but she couldn't keep the images of the past few hours from playing on an endless loop.

It had taken longer than Temari had assumed it would to move all the casualties. There was only a small handful of ninja who were in good enough condition to help, so the process of transporting all the wounded shinobi to the hospital was laborious and slow-going. A couple of Sand Nin had staggered off to fetch the Medical Ninja, and a bunch of stretchers had been brought to the battlefield, but the fact remained that there simply weren't enough stretchers, or able-bodied people, in the village to really make much of a difference.

Gaara, in a stroke of genius, had finally had the idea to use his sand as makeshift gurneys, but he could still only safely transport seven or eight casualties at a time. The ones with critical wounds were transported first, and the second wave included all the ones with major bleeding, like Kankuro, and the ones with broken bones. Temari picked out most of the Leaf Nin in that group. It wasn't until the last group, the one with the most superficial injuries, had moved out, that Temari had finally felt a bit of her burden lift from her shoulders. The worst was over—all that remained now was somehow managing to heal all of them.

She really wished she'd listened more closely when Granny Chiyo had tried to give her an intro to Medical Ninjutsu. It was a tradition in the Hidden Sand for all the kunoichi to be trained in basic Medical techniques, but the fact remained that Temari was far better at cutting things up than she was at putting them back together again.

But this was no time to dwell on her shortcomings; she just had to do what little she could to help her village at present. She raised her arm so that she could wipe her teary eyes on her sleeve, and she desperately hoped it would just look like she was wiping the sweat off her brow. She hated outward signs of weakness, especially in herself. Thinking she'd given herself enough time to recover from her sudden onslaught of emotion, she turned her gaze back to Shikamaru and feared that she would tear up again when she saw his face. His brow was furrowed in pain, but his gaze was far away, as if he weren't even aware of himself. Temari realized rather suddenly that the pain she saw in him was not his own, or at least it wasn't from his wounds. She realized that he was worried about his friends more than he was worried about himself. She realized that, even after saving her village from an army of rogue ninja, that he felt no pride, or even joy. That look on his face gave nothing away but sadness and fear.

"'ow bad?" he croaked.

"I don't know, Nara. They're all at the hospital, and they were in pretty bad shape, but I think they'll all pull through. You know them better than I do, but given the Leaf Shinobi I know, I'd bet my life they'll be fine."

If she'd thought that would appease him in the slightest, she was sorely disappointed. She saw a slight shift in his facial muscles; where there had been sadness there was now cold determination.

"Help me up, 'Mari," he mumbled in a detached voice she'd never heard him use before.

"Huh?"

"Help me up. I wanna walk."

She thought of the last time she'd seen him this shaken up, after his first mission as a Chunin Captain. She remembered how distraught he'd been when he'd discovered the extent of his friends' injuries, how useless he'd felt pacing the hospital waiting room. She could certainly understand why he would feel the need to walk the rest of the way—at least then he'd feel as though he was doing something.

"Okay, Nara," she conceded. "Gaara!" she called. Her brother tilted his head in her direction and she saw that his red hair was hanging in wet clumps, and that his forehead was wrinkled in concentration and sparkling with sweat. His hands were raised commandingly in front of him, ensuring the security of the casualties currently riding on his sand. He didn't say anything in acknowledgement to Temari's shouts—he couldn't afford the energy—but she knew he was listening. "Will you let Nara down?"

He grunted in response, and with a slow, gentle rotation of his right hand, the sand beneath Shikamaru began to give way and he was tilted gradually until his feet grazed the Earth. Shikamaru took his first tentative step, and Temari saw his knees buckle slightly from the pain he surely felt, but he locked his jaw, endured, and began to walk.

The only problem was that he was walking away from the hospital.

He had never felt such pain. Whatever that Lightning Chakra had done to him, he sincerely hoped it would wear off soon, because this was a serious drag. With each step, every muscle in his body felt as if they were being attacked by thousands of malicious needles. The tiny, pinpricked resonant pain of the electric shock was crippling. And yet, he forced himself to move faster, faster, as he made a futile attempt to run away from his conscience.

You got your friends hurt again, egged the little voice in his head. Again…

And still his feet moved faster, left right left right left right left right, and the pounding in his chest was starting to drown out that evil voice, and then out of nowhere he felt a hand on his shoulder. Fortunately, it was his unwounded shoulder, but when every cell in one's body is on fire, it doesn't really matter which ones show obvious signs of damage.

"Where are you going?!" Temari's voice screeched shrilly. He wasn't sure if her voice had actually risen to such a high octave or if it was just his brain still struggling to leave its half-awake state, but at any rate, now his ears hurt too. He didn't stop walking.

"Away," he replied evasively, as he didn't really have an answer.

"What? No, Shikamaru, you're hurt. We have to take you to the hosp—"

"No," he interrupted as he imagined his friends' bodies splayed out in the sand, broken and blood-streaked. "Let the hospital take care o' the people who really need 'elp. I'm fine."

"But Nara—"

"I said I'm fine!" he yelled as he screeched to a halt. He whipped around to face Temari (OWWWWWWW, screamed the voice in his head), and he immediately regretted it. Her cherubic face had contorted into a frightening mixture of concern and anger, and both emotions were making brutal plays for dominance as their battle raged across her face. One second, Temari's eyes would narrow, her nostrils would flare, her jaw would make a hard line; the next second, everything would relax. Finally, though, concern won out.

"Nara…" she began warily. "Don't make a stupid mistake just because you're worried about your friends. I know how you get in situations like this, and I don't want you to wind up hurting yourself."

Shikamaru chuckled cynically. "I'm Shikaku Nara's son," he deadpanned. "I wasn't raised to make stupid mistakes."

With that, he turned on his heel and began to walk away once more. Thankfully, the simple act of moving was beginning to ease some of the agony in his muscles; he was no longer in such Earth-shattering pain that he was slurring horribly or limping. There remained, though, the small problem that he had no idea where he was going.

Temari was having none of this. "But someone has to stitch up your wounds! They'll get infected if nobody looks at them, and—"

"You can sew, can't you?" he demanded, stopping and rotating slightly, peering at her over his shoulder.

"Well, yeah, kind of…"

"Then you can do it."

Temari, dumbfounded, averted her gaze. Her? Heal somebody? She would have burst out laughing, had it not been for the expression on Shikamaru's face. He was dead serious—he had no intention whatsoever of going to the hospital. She still thought it was a stupid idea, but she had to sympathize with him on some level. After all, he, as a captain, had been unable to protect his friends, and as a result, they had all been seriously injured.

If she really thought about it, though, she supposed it was all sort of her fault for asking them to come in the first place, but she didn't think she'd be pointing that out to him anytime soon.

Or ever.

She heaved a sigh of resignation and raised her eyes to meet his once more. "All right," she agreed, "but you can't blame me when you wind up with some sort of hideous scar."

She could have sworn she saw the corners of his mouth twitch at that, but it was probably just her imagination. "Oh, I'm not worried," he replied. "I'm in good hands."

Why the hell did you say that? demanded the little voice in Shikamaru's head. Are you stupid? This bitch is crazy.

He remembered the moment of the battle where she had nearly killed him in a fit of disorientation and bloodlust. She really was crazy—a warrior through and through. But then he remembered the way her eyes had softened around the edges when she had been talking to Gaara and when she had looked down at him on the sand gurney.

He realized that he was probably in good hands after all. Temari may not have liked to look it, but she cared a great deal. Maybe she wasn't the cold-blooded, cruel kunoichi he'd made her out to be.

Shikamaru felt himself relax visibly, much of the pent-up tension leaving his muscles all in one exhale. He felt almost back to normal, the only real pain left was in his shoulder and his lower back, where he assumed the shuriken had penetrated. If he thought about it honestly, he had walked away with very minimal injuries, given the intensity of the battle, and once they were stitched up, he'd be back to one-hundred-percent in no time. He shifted his stance slightly, balancing on his left leg and twisting the ball of his right foot into the sand beneath him, and flashed Temari a genuine smile.

"I trust you," he confessed. "Really."

With that, he pivoted and started to walk away again.

"Nara," Temari began hesitantly.

"Yeah?" he called over his shoulder, barely slowing his pace.

"Where are you going?"

Shikamaru halted abruptly. "Didn't you ask that already?" he asked.

"No, I mean that you're going the wrong way."

Shikamaru turned to face her again. "Oh yeah?"

Temari's mouth curled into a tentative smirk as she jerked her thumb over her shoulder, pointing toward the center of the village. "My house is that way."

What a troublesome woman, went his inner voice. Shikamaru shook his head in a vain attempt to dislodge the annoying whispers, shrugging as if he were unfazed by his mistake. "Lead the way," he sighed, falling into place behind her.

I wish the lighting were better, thought Temari as she looked down at Shikamaru's back. It had been about twenty minutes since they'd arrived at the Hidden Sand's headquarters building and made their way up to the apartment Temari shared with her brothers. The apartment was neither particularly large nor particularly homey, as none of the three siblings spent a great deal of time there aside from sleeping, but it was home nonetheless. Temari's room shot off from the space that served as a sitting room, a dining room, and a kitchen, and it was easily the smallest bedroom in the apartment. When she'd asked Kankuro how she'd wound up with the smallest bedroom, he'd told her that he needed all the space he could get to store his puppets, and Gaara's the fucking Kazekage. The Kazekage can't have a tiny bedroom—that's demoralizing. Actually, the apartment's only redeeming quality was the fact that it had a small balcony overlooking the city.

But in any case, her bedroom was small—there was just enough room for a Queen-size bed, if she neglected herself the luxury of floor space, and she was still able to open the door to her closet (barely). Aside from her bed, the only piece of furniture was a thin bedside table housing a lone lamp. The lack of light had never bothered her before—in the desert, during the day at least, there was certainly no one lacking for sunlight, and at night, if she had any work to catch up on, the lamp provided plenty of illumination by which to read, but stitching up a wound was a different story entirely, as she was finding out.

It had been difficult to even reach the wounds, let alone fix them. Shikamaru wore a surprising amount of layers. She'd had to carefully remove his vest, followed by his long-sleeved shirt. Well, those had been simple enough, but then beneath those there was the fishnet.

Temari was no stranger to fishnet. She wore it under most of her outfits; it was good at keeping things in place. But it was also very quick to attach itself to any blood that happened to be drying in the vicinity, and once it latches onto dried blood, it's about as easy to separate as rubber cement.

She'd had to rummage in the bathroom cupboard for ages before she'd found the rubbing alcohol and cotton balls, and then she'd had to fish around in her closet to find her sewing kit. She had panicked briefly during that particular search, as she had absolutely no idea what sort of thread one was supposed to use to stitch up a wound, but then she pushed those doubts aside, deciding that if Shikamaru was going to be this stubborn in the first place, then plain old black thread would work just fine.

She'd then rushed back to Shikamaru's side and begun the painstaking process of removing his fishnet undershirt thread by thread, first soaking the area with rubbing alcohol and then tenderly wiggling the fabric free of its rust-red, congealed bonds. By the time the last thread had come loose, nearly ten minutes had passed, and more than a few gasps of pain had escaped Shikamaru's lips. Strangely, though, he hadn't been very vocal during the process—if she had been in his position, she'd have been cursing everyone and their mother; she, for one, knew just how badly rubbing alcohol stung on an open wound. She wondered for a moment if he was making some sort of chivalrous attempt to be brave for her, but she knew that wasn't in his nature. Shikamaru wasn't afraid of showing emotion. She honestly thought that he was simply too consumed by his other thoughts to even notice that he was in pain until the stinging had already begun to fade.

Temari shook her head, smiling sadly. She'd never thought that she'd ever meet anyone who cared too much about his friends, but there you go. The universe just loved to prove her wrong.

And now, as she looked down at the threaded needle she'd bent into a gentle curve for the stitching process, her thoughts turned back to the immediate dilemma. Could she actually do this? Would she be able to heal him, or would this all go horribly wrong?

She raised the needle until it was level with the right edge of the slice in his shoulder, but paused before she pricked the skin. Kneeling there, with the needle hovering millimeters above the surface of the skin, she noticed Shikamaru's right hand curl into a tight fist, with white knuckles and protruding veins to match. He was bracing himself, as if he'd read her mind.

She couldn't screw this up. She owed him, big time, and she was not going to mess this up. She took a deep breath and tilted her head up, eyes boring through the ceiling as she thought, Lady Chiyo, if you can spare the time, I could really use your help right about now.

"Are you gonna keep me waiting all night, or are you going to start soon?" she somehow heard over the pounding in her head. He spoke lightly, as if he were trying to diffuse the situation.

"Hn?" she jumped as she snapped out of her inner monologue. "Oh, yeah. Okay." She re-focused her attention on Shikamaru's seeping wound and re-aligned the needle. She took one last deep breath, and then plunged the needle into the tender skin.

Shikamaru had been to the hospital in the Hidden Leaf more than a few times. He'd broken bones, been concussed, pulled muscles, and gotten mild infections, but he'd never had the distinct pleasure of getting stitches. And now, he got to enjoy the whole procedure, and without anesthetic, no less. He had assumed that the initial puncture would be the worst part of the process, but much to his dismay, he was wrong. To be sure, the pricking hurt, but it was nothing compared to the sensation of the thread tugging at his skin as it slid through the tiny holes. By the time Temari started on the second stitch, he was on the verge of tears, but he refused to cry. He would not allow himself the luxury of letting out the pain while his friends were in the hospital, condition unknown. Maybe he was being a bit of a masochist, but he felt that it was okay to be masochistic every once in a while.

Besides, he'd promised himself that he wouldn't cry anymore. He was a ninja—he wasn't supposed to show emotion. That was one of the first rules they learned in the academy, one of the rules he now occasionally taught in the academy, but he had never been one for rules. He'd never paid that particular rule any mind (as Temari so loved to remind him whenever they met), and to be fair, his tears had never been unjustified. But no more. He'd promised himself after Asuma's death that he'd be stronger, despite his father's advice otherwise.

And he was stronger. Or at least he thought so.

He felt the needle pierce the skin to begin the third stitch and he took a sharp breath and clenched his jaw to the point that he thought his teeth might crumble under the pressure. He was bracing himself for the thread, it was coming, it was—

Hnnnnnnnnnnnn, grunted his inner voice as the thread tugged away. Oh, he was nauseous; he was definitely going to vomit if this kept up, but he just grit his teeth and persevered.

Temari didn't know how many more stitches she could handle. She had no doubt, based on the grunts escaping Shikamaru's mouth, that the whole process was causing him a great deal of pain, but having to see stitches being made wasn't particularly pleasant either. Watching the tip of the needle penetrate the tender, slightly inflamed flesh at the edge of the wound was disgusting, to say the least. She'd done three stitches, four, five, six…

She worked methodically, watching Shikamaru's muscles twitch with every tug of the thread. After seven, the first wound was fairly well secured—she'd probably still make him go to a hospital eventually, but it was fine for now—but now she had to deal with the next wound. That meant at least eight more stitches.

She definitely couldn't go for that much longer without some sort of distraction. Nothing too consuming, of course. Just something mindless. And hopefully something that would take some of Shikamaru's attention from the needle as well. She thought for a moment, but without much at her immediate disposal, she wasn't left with many options.

And so, as the needle broke the skin just below the second wound, she began to talk.

"I hate fighting," she said. "Or no, not fighting, but this. The cleaning up afterwards. I never wanted to be a ninja when I was little. I'd seen what happened to ninjas, what happened to their families, what happened to their friends…I knew the extent of the collateral damage. But I was the Kazekage's daughter, so I was taught whether I wanted to learn or not. I figured out pretty fast that I was good. I was really good. We didn't have a real academy in the Hidden Sand until a few years ago—well, I guess you know that; you helped us set it up—but anyway. Shinobi here used to be taught individually, for the most part. My brother and I were the exception. Kankuro, that is. Not Gaara. They kept from teaching him for a really long time. But Kankuro and I, we were taught by this great Jonin, Baki. I think you met him, at the Chunin exams? Well, he's really serious most of the time, not a guy who's quick to crack a smile at anything, but I remember that the first session I ever had with him, he smiled at me. It was a really kind smile, one of the ones you always read about in books and stuff, that completely transform someone's face. That smile made him look so…I don't know…excited. Like a little kid who'd just gotten something really cool for his birthday. It was one of those smiles that you knew you'd have to work for, but that you'd really want to see again. I worked so hard. So hard. I didn't see that smile again until I'd become a Chunin."

She took a break for breath and counted her stitches, to check how much progress she'd made. Two stitches down, six to go.

Aw man, how much more of this would he have to sit through? Every time he thought she must surely be on the last stitch, she proved him wrong. He supposed that the pain was becoming a little more monotonous now, but it still hurt like hell.

Somehow, though, he felt himself grow numb as she began to talk. He wasn't sure how, but the words coming out of her mouth seemed to float down to cradle the needle and gently massage his aching muscles. The words eased into his ears and scrambled his brain, a pleasant distraction.

As he listened to her story, he began to wonder. He'd been sent on missions with this kunoichi; he'd rescued her, she'd rescued him; they'd planned the Chunin Exams together the previous year, but had he ever actually heard her talk about herself? In all the time they'd spent together, he didn't think she'd ever said a word about her past. She was usually so hard, so cruel, but here he was, sitting, being stitched up as tenderly as if it were his own mother doing the work, and listening to Temari's strong façade crumble. She spoke softly, in a near whisper, almost as though she didn't want the world to know what she was disclosing. As if she didn't even care if Shikamaru heard.

He eventually figured out that Temari didn't care. She may have been pretending to tell her story for his benefit, but it seemed that she was just telling it to have said it out loud.

Shikamaru knew from personal experience that sometimes just saying something out loud could make all the difference.

He exhaled slightly as he felt the needle prick his skin for the third stitch, and she began to talk once more.

"It was hard to become a Chunin," she continued. "Way harder than I'd thought. I didn't make it that first year, thanks to you. I'd never had to face another tactician. I guess I'd gotten used to being the smartest person in the room, but that's a dangerous thing to get used to when you're a shinobi. I honestly thought you were an idiot. I mean, I'll admit that I was impressed by the way you defeated that woman from the Sound village in the Preliminaries, but I genuinely just thought that she was stupid, or something. You were just so…lazy. Which, I guess, was why you were so good. You always defeated your enemy in the fewest possible moves. Your sensei definitely taught you well there. Heh. Maybe when you get back, he can give you a few more lessons on how to avoid getting hit by shuriken, since you seem to have misunderstood a few of the key points there."

She laughed silently for a moment, and he felt a gentle wave of hot breath on the back of his neck as a chill shot through his system at the mention of Asuma. She had no way of knowing, of course, but it was a little bit of a shock hearing someone talk about his sensei in the present tense, like he would be waiting for Shikamaru when he returned to the Hidden Leaf. He shivered as her laughter died out.

"So I lost. I lost, and then we went ahead with that asshole Orochimaru's plan, and our village's reputation was completely destroyed because of one ridiculous diplomatic blunder, and…I don't know. But that was a really bad time in the village. And Kankuro, Gaara, and I had lost our father…" She paused, inhaling sharply before beginning again. He'd expected there to be a bit of a tremble in her voice, but what he heard instead was barely-suppressed rage. "He really was a terrible father. I wish I could say I was sad when he was killed, but if I did I'd be a liar. I mean, Kankuro, Gaara, and I all have different mothers, for starters. Our former Kazekage was a little more free-wheeling than the previous ones. And then there's the fact that all our mothers are dead. Dad told me that they were all the victims of tragic accidents the one time I asked, but I could tell he was lying. He'd had them killed. I don't know how, and I don't know why, but he did. So we had to grow up without our mothers, and then our father all but abandoned us. The only time I saw him when I was a kid was when he came home from his office. And then he'd just shut himself in his bedroom and he wouldn't come out until the following morning, but he'd be gone before any of us woke up. We basically raised each other; no one else in the village would come near us. I didn't even have friends growing up. Everyone was too afraid of Gaara to associate with me. Hell, I was afraid of Gaara. When he finally started his shinobi training, I was amazed that Baki was able to get through a whole training session without wetting his pants."

He could hear the one-sided smile creeping back into her voice, the jagged edges on her words gradually rounding out. He knew why; he knew what happened next.

He realized somewhat belatedly that he hadn't felt the needle's point or the thread's horrible tugging for a while now. He had no idea whether she hadn't started any new stitches or if he'd somehow gotten so lost in her words that he simply hadn't noticed. He didn't really mind either way, of course, but it was interesting.

That's four stitches done, thought Temari. Only four left.

The corners of her mouth twitched upward as she opened her mouth to finish her story. "That was when I thought there was nowhere to go but down, but then something amazing happened. I still don't completely know what happened in that battle, but whatever that Naruto kid said to my brother…I don't know if I'll ever be able to thank him properly. I know Gaara's said his bit to him, but I want him to hear it from me, too. After that fight, Gaara was so…different. He used to be a boy who would kill you just for standing somewhere he didn't want you to, but he became so kind. He tried so hard to make amends for everything he'd done in the past. At first, people were so suspicious of him. When a monster starts smiling and trying to be friendly, any sane person would be a little uneasy, but eventually most people warmed up to him. That was really the only thing that kept our village from crumbling after the Orochimaru fiasco. But Gaara gave up his whole me-against-the-world act and the village started to be good again, and then we got word from the Hokage that you and your team were in trouble on some mission, so we came to help, and just…man, I can't tell you how pissed I was when I saw you wearing that damned Chunin vest. Just…no. I still remember how much of an impression that made on me. Half of me wanted to abandon you, and just let that crazy redhead finish you off. Most of me wanted that, actually. But there was this tiny part of me that wanted to step in. Payback, you know? You make an idiot of me; I return the favor."

She shook her head, remembering the look of horror on his face when he'd realized she was there to rescue him. "I think part of me wanted to prove myself to you, too. 'Cause you were such a terrible chauvinist and all. I wanted to make sure you knew kunoichi could hold their own in battle." She giggled darkly. "I think I proved my point."

She paused briefly to check the alignment of her fifth stitch. It was a bit crooked, but Shikamaru would just have to deal with it. She rolled her shoulders, stretching out the kinks in her joints. Being a Medic sure was hard work.

"After that, everything got better. The Hidden Leaf trusted us again, the Hidden Sand respected Gaara more, we started to fix everything that was broken. And I got promoted. Baki was so proud of my brothers and I that he promoted us to Chunin as soon as we got back. That's when he smiled. I remember that, more than anything else…but anyway. About a year later, we became Jonin, and Gaara was promoted all the way to Kazekage, and I was put in his personal guard with Kankuro, and that's how things have been ever since. Actually, that's a lie. I wasn't put into his personal guard. I've never admitted this to Gaara, or even Kankuro, but I went to the council and requested to be taken off the list of shinobi for formal missions. I was still so afraid of fighting. I couldn't keep on risking my—no, not my. My family's lives. They're all I have, you know? I wasn't gonna let them become another statistic. So I got the best job I could possibly get—I was paid to protect my little brother. 'Cause that's really the only time I feel good about fighting: when I'm protecting something I care about. I think I might go a little overboard sometimes. Kankuro always tells me that I get really scary in battle, and you probably think I'm some sort of crazy person. I've been called a lot of things—scary, cruel…—but I can't help it. I think I just care too much. I may hate fighting, but I'll be the first one to the battlefield if I find out anyone I love is in danger. If I have to die in this line of work, then so be it. Gaara's and Kankuro's lives are worth ten of mine."

She exhaled sharply, savoring the truths that were escaping from her lips. She'd never said any of this out loud, and it felt so liberating to finally tell someone. She knew Shikamaru wouldn't judge her, or think this was a weakness. He would understand.

"I know you feel the same way. I saw it in your face during the battle, when you were watching your friends. I always thought it was so funny that people as different as we are could have something like that in common. When you were setting off the explosions...the look on your face looked so much like how Kankuro described mine. It was eerie. But then, the Hidden Leaf has a reputation for that sort of thing. Protecting their comrades, I mean. That's something I've always admired about your village. There aren't that many people here who think that way. Here, it's every man looking out for his own interests, and to hell with everyone else's." She sighed. "It's barbaric."

She counted the stitches—seven done, one left.

"Well anyway, it's nice to know that some village somewhere has its priorities in order," she concluded, poising the needle to begin the final stitch.

Suddenly, she thought she heard Shikamaru speak. He hadn't made a sound for what felt like hours, but she could've sworn she'd heard his voice. She thought he'd mumbled something about the 'Will of Fire,' but that couldn't have been what he'd said; that didn't make any sense.

"What'd you say, Nara?" she asked, still half-believing she'd imagined his voice.

"The Will of Fire," said Shikamaru, more strongly this time. "We have to protect the King."

"The King? What do you mean, like the Hokage?"

He chuckled good-naturedly and his back vibrated jarringly under the needle. "That's what I thought at first, too." He didn't elaborate.

"So then who is it?" she asked, unsure exactly why she was so curious.

"It doesn't work like that. It's not something I can just tell you. You have to figure it out for yourself," he replied cryptically.

Well Nara is no help at all, thought Temari as she pulled the thread taut after making the final stitch. She tied off the thread and admired her handiwork. She ran a finger lightly across each row of stitches and saw Shikamaru's back ripple under her touch as he shivered. Her eyes lingered for a moment on the slightly uneven stitching and the effect it had on his muscular back, but then she shook herself from her thoughts.

"You're all set," she said gruffly.

Shikamaru struggled momentarily to get to his feet after such a long period of sitting, but he got up, rolled his shoulders a few times to make sure the stitches wouldn't snap, and proceeded to turn to face her.

"Thanks," he said, but Temari wasn't really listening. She was staring at his bare chest, which was riddled with small pockmarks and scars, tiny bands of raised, pink skin on his otherwise streamlined frame. She'd always assumed he was sort of skinny and weak, but she saw now that that was not the case at all. He was definitely svelte, but where she'd expected vast expanses of soft flesh, she found shadows betraying the existence of toned abdominals and a thin trail of dark hair creeping toward his bellybutton.

Distracted, it took her a few moments to realize that he was wrapping his arms around himself and his teeth were chattering quietly.

"Oh shit, are you cold?" Temari asked dumbly. Idiot, of course he's cold, she thought. We're in the goddamn desert. It gets cold at night. "I'll…um…get you some of Kankuro's clothes to sleep in."

She glanced quickly up at the clock on her wall, startling when she discovered it was already past midnight. "You can sleep in here," she offered. "I can sleep on the couch until we figure something out."

"It's alright," he protested. "I can sleep on the cou—"

"No," interrupted Temari as she left her room and navigated her way to Kankuro's. She rooted around in his closet until she found some clothes Shikamaru could use and called, "You take the bed. You need a good night's sleep more than I do right now."

She quickly returned to her room, tossing the clothes to Shikamaru. He caught them automatically, and then looked down at them as if he were surprised they were there. "Thanks, 'Mari," he responded sleepily.

"Don't mention it," she returned. She walked back to the doorway, pausing briefly to mumble, "Good night, Nara," over her shoulder. She walked purposefully toward the living room, grabbing some sheets and a pillow from a stack of fresh laundry on a nearby chair. She threw them onto the couch haphazardly and then fell forward, unable to stand any longer. She was asleep before she'd hit the pillow.

Shikamaru, try as he might, couldn't sleep. He'd tossed and turned for what must have been hours, but his mind wouldn't let him rest. Every time his eyelids finally fluttered shut, he'd suddenly see a flash of Choji crumpled on the ground with a slit throat, or Naruto with his yellow hair stained blood red, or Hinata with her eyes as blank as ever, but now with a deadness to match. His brain tortured him endlessly with thoughts of his friends in the hospital, condition unknown. Your friends could be dying for all you know, nagged the little voice in his head, and you're here sitting pretty in the comfort of Temari's bed. You sicken me.

The voice was little more than a whisper, but Shikamaru heard it as though it were shouting. Finally, it got to be too much, so he got up and did the only thing he could think to do that had any potential to calm him down: he got out of bed, fished around in the pile of dirty clothes on the floor until he'd found his pack of emergency cigarettes and his lighter, and then he tip-toed out to the balcony, careful not to wake the quietly-snoring Temari.

Standing outside in the cool night air and the moon's milky glow, he placed a cigarette between his chapped lips and began to fumble with the lighter with his trembling fingers.

Click…click…click…

When the fire finally caught, he lifted the flame to lick the tip of the cigarette and gratefully sucked the first throat-searing breath. He savored the taste of the smoke as it filled his lungs, and he felt his trembling subside almost instantly. The calm slowly seeped throughout his body, permeating from his very core, and much to his dismay, as he relaxed, he felt a single tear slip down his face.

He sighed, smoke leaking from his mouth and nostrils. Smoking and crying: the two things he'd promised himself he'd quit, and here he was, in the dead of night, doing both of them. He carried the cigarettes not because he needed them, but because they were a small memento of Asuma. He'd thought he'd quit after his battle with Hidan, but apparently he'd lied to himself. He couldn't believe how much he'd been craving a cigarette for the past few hours.

But this is the last one, he promised himself.

He took another desperate pull on the cigarette.

Temari whimpered as he thrusted, biting her lip so hard she tasted blood. She wrapped her fingers in his long, black hair as he nibbled on her earlobe. Her hips bucked against his, sending shivers down her spine. One of his hands moved from its place on her ass and lightly traced its way up her waist until it came to rest on her breast. His fingers stroked gently as he pressed her ever deeper into the thick bedding. She arched her back in pleasure, moaning…

"Shikamaru," she begged. "More."

He obliged, smoothly maneuvering until he was pressed deep against her core. He leaned down to meet her lips with his, and she gasped as he kissed her. Her hands roamed, grasping desperately at his muscular shoulders as a cry built in her chest. She was reaching her limit.

Temari awoke rather abruptly, breathing harder than she should have been. Man, what was I dreaming about? she wondered. Must have been a nightmare or something.

She rubbed at her eyes, slowly bringing herself back to full alertness. She squinted to read the clock on the wall and found that it was 3:28 AM. She cursed herself for waking at such an ungodly hour, but she soon noticed the stale smell of smoke. She looked around the apartment frantically, thinking something was on fire, but then her eyes alighted on a shadowy figure on the balcony and the subtle glow of the embers of a cigarette. She grudgingly got up from her resting place on the couch and padded toward the balcony doors.

Distracted by the smoky haze and the view of the full moon, Shikamaru nearly jumped out of his skin when he heard a voice behind him suddenly taunt, "Picking up your sensei's bad habits, are we?"

Quickly regaining his composure, he glanced over his shoulder. "Hey, Temari," he said nonchalantly. "Sorry, did I wake you?"

"Not at all," she replied, coming to join him at the balcony rail. She looked up at the moon with her heavy-lidded blue eyes and asked, "So when did that start?"

"What?"

"The smoking."

"Oh…not that long ago. Maybe a month?"

"Ah," she sighed. "You should quit while you can. It's a terrible habit to get into. Just ask your sensei. I bet he could tell you."

Shikamaru scowled as he remembered the events of the past couple months. "Yeah," he hedged. "He tried to quit once."

"Oh yeah? How come? He doesn't seem like the type to quit cold-turkey without good reason."

"He has a baby on the way, with Kurenai," careful to phrase it so that it was in the present tense, but not a lie. "Do you remember Kurenai?" he continued. "She was at the Chunin exams too. Great lady. Excellent kunoichi. He tried to quit for her and the baby. He was doing pretty well too," he commented, wincing as he heard the implied but at the end of the sentence.

Unfortunately, that but didn't go unnoticed. "So why didn't he quit?" inquired Temari. "What happened? What changed?"

Shikamaru swallowed a lump that had risen in his throat and took another drag on the cigarette before answering. "He died," he stated matter-of-factly as he exhaled.

Temari whipped her head around to face him, her eyes wide with shock. "What?"

"Yeah," grunted Shikamaru, flicking the ashes from the tip of his cigarette. "He's dead."

"Asuma? Big, strong Asuma?"

"Yep."

"How?"

"He got killed by two Akatsuki."

Temari's eyes opened even wider at that. "What happened?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

"Try me."

"Maybe I'll tell you the whole story later, but it doesn't matter anyway; we defeated them. That's the only thing that matters."

"Wait, you—you defeated an Akatsuki?!"

"Yeah," he shrugged. "I mean, he was such a loudmouth, the one who killed Asuma. It was kind of a drag fighting him, 'cause he was such an asshole, but whatever. The others took care of the difficult one, and I got my revenge."

"Wait, are you saying that you defeated an Akatsuki single-handedly?"

Shikamaru raised the cigarette to his lips again and took a short puff. "Yeah," he deadpanned, as if that were no big deal.

"Man, just when I thought I was catching up…" Temari mumbled.

"Huh?" Shikamaru asked, unsure he'd heard right.

"Nothing," Temari quickly replied. "Well…I'm sorry, Nara. If I'd known I wouldn't've…you know…" she trailed off.

"It's not a big deal," Shikamaru assured. "What's done is done; there's no point in wondering what would've happened if things had been different."

Hypocrite, went the voice in his head. Take your own advice, you moron.

And it was true—he clearly couldn't let go of the past. The cigarette smoldering away between his fingers was clear evidence of that. So why should he go telling others to forgive and forget? He shook off his doubts and tried to provide Temari with some rationale.

"I started smoking right after he died, and I quit pretty soon after that. Or I'd thought I had," he explained haltingly. "I just…" he began, "I guess I'm just worried about my friends. I couldn't sleep and I needed to calm down."

He wasn't looking at her, but he could feel Temari's pitying gaze boring into the side of his head. She slowly pivoted and walked toward him until she was no more than a foot from him.

"Nara," she pleaded. "Don't worry; they'll be fine." "Don't forget that my brother's hurt too. I'm just as worried as you are." She sighed, and he could hear the concern in her voice. "We'll go to the hospital first thing tomorrow, okay?"

Shikamaru turned his head slightly so that he met her intense gaze with his droopy-eyed, half-asleep one. "Okay," he whispered, but then he was struck by a sudden question. "Hey," he began. "Why'd you tell me all that earlier?" He was asking not to pry, but simply to see if he'd been right before.

Temari took a deep gulp of night air, and when she exhaled the breath misted over. Shikamaru's mouth twitched. It almost looked like she was smoking too. "I don't know," she said. "I think I just felt like talking, and I thought you would listen." She tilted her head up at him and their eyes met. "You're a good friend, Nara," she smiled.

With that, Temari reached over and plucked the cigarette from his lazy fingers and tossed it over the side of the balcony into the smothering sand below. "Go get some sleep," she commanded. "It's been a long day."

End Notes: Well that took forever. I'm afraid that this chapter got a bit too introspective, that it has too much circuitous inner dialogue, and not nearly enough (by which I mean absolutely NO) action, but oh well. It's too late now.

In any case, I desperately hope that you all enjoyed this chapter. Don't forget to Review! I crave your feedback, and any constructive criticism is always greatly appreciated.

And next time: how will Shikamaru and Temari handle the visit to the hospital? And what of these so-called 'nightmares' of Temari's?