Chapter 3
+Shikamaru Nara+
If anyone had ever told Shikamaru Nara that Sasuke Uchiha would one day actually listen to his advice, or, worse, willingly hand over team leadership to him, he would have laughed so hard his chronic laziness wouldn't have been able to keep him upright. The idea was that absurd.
He had shared a classroom with Sasuke for six full years. He knew him. Or at least, he thought he did. That ironclad pride of Sasuke's had never once cracked, not even after the massacre that wiped out his entire clan in a single night.
If anything, the loss had only sharpened it, turning pride into something colder, more stubborn, more unyielding. Sasuke Uchiha was precisely the kind of person Shikamaru had always gone out of his way to avoid: intense, solitary, far too proud to ever bend or compromise.
The notion of working together, of genuine cooperation, would have seemed laughable… until today.
Nearly three hours had passed since the two teams had agreed to merge their forces.
And, unbelievably, things were going smoothly. Too smoothly.
'It's because of him,' Shikamaru thought, eyes half-lidded as he watched the scene ahead.
The Konoha team that had attempted to ambush them now lay sprawled across the forest floor in various states of defeat, disarmed, wrists bound with thin ninja wire, faces pressed into the damp earth that still smelled faintly of rain from earlier.
Their carefully laid trap, tripwires linked to explosive tags and a shallow pit covered with leaves, had been reversed in under thirty seconds, all thanks to Sasuke. He hadn't even bothered to activate his Sharingan. A handful of precise taijutsu strikes combined with economical bukijutsu movements, redirecting thrown kunai mid-flight back at their owners, had turned their ambush into a perfect counter-ambush. Clean. Efficient. Almost effortless.
"As we said before," Sasuke said coolly, crouching as he methodically searched through their pouches and scroll holders, fingers moving with practised detachment, "we're also a Konoha team."
The enemy team's supposed leader, a wiry boy with a bandana tied low over one eye and a fresh bruise already blooming across his cheek, spat into the dirt. "Like that matters anymore. It's every team for themselves in here. Not like you two squads who decided to play nice and team up!"
Sasuke didn't even glance up from his task. "So you're saying we shouldn't have gone easy on you? Is that it?"
Shikamaru met the pinned boy's glare with his trademark bored, half-lidded stare, letting the silence stretch just long enough for the unspoken implication to sink deep. The truth was brutally simple: the instant their trap had sprung, his team could have ended the fight permanently, kunai to the throat, a well-placed explosion tag, or one of Choji's enlarged fists. The fact that the enemy was still breathing was courtesy, not mercy.
The realisation struck them like a physical blow. One by one, defiant expressions crumbled into uneasy, uncomfortable silence, eyes darting nervously between Sasuke and the rest of the group.
"An Earth Scroll," Sasuke announced a moment later. He pulled the small cylinder from the leader's pouch and tossed it lightly toward Sakura without looking. She caught it smoothly, checked the seal with a quick thumb press, then tucked it securely beside their own Earth Scroll in her hip pouch.
Even though it wasn't the Heaven Scroll Team, 7 still desperately needed to pass the second exam; it wasn't a bad result. A spare scroll represented leverage, something they could trade to a desperate team for what they actually wanted, or plant as bait to draw in and distract a genuinely dangerous opponent. Shikamaru's mind was already turning over the possibilities: feints, controlled diversions, staged engagements. Options were always better than none.
"I didn't even get the chance to do anything!" Naruto burst out as he stepped from the thick underbrush where he'd been concealed. His arms crossed tightly over his chest, face flushed with frustration and restless energy, orange jacket streaked with dirt and leaf fragments. "I was ready! I could've, "
"That's the good news," Ino cut in dryly, emerging from her flanking position and walking beside Sakura. "You staying out of sight meant we didn't have to babysit you in the middle of a fight."
Naruto puffed up indignantly, mouth opening for a retort, but the teasing carried no real bite. The banter had become almost routine over the last few hours, a small way to keep the tension from boiling over.
Over the last few hours, the new formation had settled into place almost instinctively: Sasuke and Choji anchored the front line, Sasuke's blinding speed and surgical precision paired with Choji's overwhelming raw power and partial expansion techniques made them an absolute nightmare to approach head-on.
Shikamaru remained in the support role, directing movement with quiet hand signals, laying wire traps when time allowed, and coordinating timing with his shadow possession when the situation called for it.
Sakura, Ino, and Naruto formed the rear ambush unit, poised to collapse in from behind the moment the enemy fully committed.
'If only Naruto could still use his Shadow Clones.' The thought nagged at Shikamaru again.
Those mass-clone feints would have turned every encounter into effortless overkill, decoys everywhere, pressure from every angle. But whatever Orochimaru had done with Naruto's chakra control, his coils were still raw and disrupted; even the simplest techniques fizzled out before they could properly form, leaving only faint sparks and a frustrated growl from Naruto. Physically, he was fine, annoyingly energetic, even, but ninjutsu was off the table for now.
"I sense someone," Ino said suddenly, her head tilting toward a distant cluster of towering trees. Her voice dropped to a low, serious whisper. "Only one chakra signature… It's large. Almost as much as Asuma-sensei's reserves. But it's moving fast, away from us. And it feels… panicked."
She glanced at Shikamaru, waiting.
No one else spoke. The decision rested with him.
He exhaled slowly through his nose, reached down, and retrieved a kunai from the forest floor. He spun it once between his fingers, a small, habitual motion, before gripping it properly.
"Same formation," he said quietly. "Ino, keep your senses open. We don't want to walk straight into a second ambush."
He didn't need to add the warning; she already knew, but saying it out loud had become second nature. In a place like this forest, "better safe than sorry" had long since stopped being a cliché. It was survival.
Shikamaru flicked his gaze toward Sasuke. The Uchiha gave a small, almost imperceptible nod, already shifting his stance to take point. Behind him, Choji cracked his knuckles with a low, deliberate sound. Sakura drew several kunai in a smooth motion, eyes sharp. Ino's expression tightened in concentration, her sensory focus narrowing. Even Naruto, for once, swallowed his complaints and fell silently into step.
The group moved as one, silent, alert, and surprisingly synchronised.
Troublesome as the whole situation was… maybe this alliance wasn't such a bad idea after all.
...
It didn't take the group long to close the distance. A few minutes of cautious, silent movement through the forest, dodging low branches, stepping over tangled roots, brought them to the source of the chakra signature Ino had sensed. What they found stopped them cold.
There, right in front of them, a lone genin from Kusagakure was desperately trying to flee from a mutated chakra beast. The thing was enormous, a bear swollen to grotesque proportions, its fur matted and patchy, black veins pulsing visibly beneath the skin like living cords, eyes glowing with unnatural red light. It lumbered after the girl with terrifying persistence, claws gouging deep furrows into the earth with every stride, uprooting small saplings in its wake.
Shikamaru shot Ino a quick, questioning glance, silently asking if this frightened redhead was the source of the massive chakra reading she'd picked up.
He knew better than most that raw chakra volume didn't automatically translate to strength. Naruto Uzumaki, standing right beside him and currently fidgeting with restless energy, was living proof of that. Still… watching how wide-eyed and terrified the girl looked, how clumsily she stumbled over roots and low branches, Shikamaru couldn't shake the suspicion.
Any halfway-competent genin should have been able to at least outmanoeuvre or outrun something like this bear, even if they couldn't kill it outright. The fact that she was this panicked felt almost too convenient. A perfect way to lower everyone's guard.
"The only thing eye-catching about her is that ridiculous amount of chakra… and the bright red hair," Ino murmured, stepping out from cover beside him. Her tone carried a mix of curiosity and faint disdain.
Shikamaru didn't respond. He didn't need to.
In the next instant, Sasuke was already moving. He launched himself forward in a single fluid leap, twisted mid-air, and drove a brutal drop kick straight into the side of the bear's thick skull. The impact rang out like a thunderclap. The beast's head snapped sideways; its massive body staggered, then collapsed in a heap, unconscious before it even hit the ground. Dirt and leaves exploded outward from the force, a small cloud drifting lazily in the still air.
The redheaded girl stumbled to a halt, gasping for breath. Her glasses had flown off somewhere during her frantic escape; she blinked rapidly, squinting at the blurry shapes around her. It was almost pitiful.
Shikamaru felt an unexpected twinge of sympathy. She clearly couldn't see properly without those glasses. For a moment, he even wondered what kind of jōnin-sensei would let someone this obviously underprepared and undertrained into the Chūnin Exams. It bordered on negligence.
"Hand over the pouch," he said, deciding to cut through the awkwardness and get it over with.
"I-I don't have any scroll," the girl stammered, voice trembling. She shrank back, eyes darting fearfully between the six of them.
The stammer, the wide-eyed panic, it only reinforced Shikamaru's earlier assessment. This girl had very little real ninja training. She moved like someone who'd barely passed the Academy basics.
Before she could even flinch, Sasuke was already behind her. In one smooth, almost casual motion, he lifted the small pouch from her belt, glanced inside, then slipped it back onto her hip without a word. Empty of scrolls, apparently.
Shikamaru felt a flicker of disappointment, but it wasn't surprising. He hadn't really been holding out much hope anyway.
'It's only the second day,' he reminded himself as the group turned to leave. 'We still have plenty of time before the sky starts to darken.'
"Hey! W-wait a moment!" the girl called out hurriedly, voice cracking with urgency. "If you want a scroll… You can find it over there."
Shikamaru paused mid-step.
'What is up with this girl…' The thought flickered through his mind even as he glanced sideways at Sasuke.
The Uchiha didn't hesitate. He simply started walking in the direction the girl had pointed, calm, unreadable, completely unbothered by the possibility of a trap.
Shikamaru didn't bother voicing the obvious warning. Sasuke wasn't stupid enough to walk blindly into something so amateurish. If there was danger, he'd sense it long before it became a problem.
The group followed.
A short distance away, half-hidden beneath the spreading roots of an ancient tree, they found it: a Heaven Scroll.
Under normal circumstances, finding the exact scroll Team 7 needed would have been cause for quiet celebration. Instead, Shikamaru felt nothing but a slow, creeping unease.
He turned his gaze back to the redheaded girl. She stood a few paces away, nervous but smiling, actually smiling, with obvious relief and something like pride that she'd been able to help them.
And there, just a few metres away from the scroll, lay the mauled bodies of two Kusa ninjas. Her teammates. No question about it. The wounds were fresh, savage, claw marks that matched the bear's too perfectly. Blood still glistened on the torn dress, pooling darkly into the soil.
Shikamaru looked from the corpses to the girl's bright, hopeful smile. Then back again.
For a long moment, he didn't know what to say. Didn't know what to feel.
'...This girl.' Shikamaru said nothing, but as his eyes met with his teammates, everyone had one thought on their mind.
''''' She definitely has a few screws loose.'''''