Chapter Text
'Aside from the code, I'm a tad bit worried about him, so thanks for checking on him.'
Kakashi's words followed Shikamaru the entire walk over to Naruto's apartment. He warned Kakashi he couldn't make any promises, but he’d known the trip was inevitable. Tsunade had declared that solving Jiraiya's code was a top priority, and it didn't take much thought for him to surmise that Naruto played a notable role in that equation.
Still, he found it distasteful to intrude on a grieving friend, especially when that grief echoed one of his own recent losses.
Reaching his hand into his front pocket, he patted the cigarette box there, his mind wandering back to the first few days after he lost Asuma. He tried to recall the words his father and his friends used as an attempt to comfort him, but many of those days belonged to a thick haze, and the words that managed to get through were things he doubted he could bring himself to repeat. Saying them would mean reliving those conversations all over again.
Unthinking fingers clicked open his pocket button and reached in, finding the hard edge of a new pack of smokes. Flicking the flimsy lid up, he reached in to pull up a cigarette. Despite the pack being as full as the day he purchased it, Shikamaru's fingers had a way of always finding the same stick. He could feel the papery edge thinning, chaffed from his repeated habit of pulling out a smoke just to tap it back down again.
This time he managed to get the stick all the way to his lips before, once again, deciding against it and tossing the loose smoke and cigarette pack both back into his chest pocket. He'd probably need it more after anyway.
He clicked his pocket button back into place and rang Naruto’s doorbell.
Nothing.
He really didn't want to repeat this whole ordeal again later.
He rang the bell a second time.
A third ring.
A fourth.
A fifth.
"Gah, he's out." Just as he stepped back to walk away, the sound of movement from inside caught his ear. The choppy start and stop of footfalls.
A pause, a click, and the drag of old hinges revealed a disheveled and listless figure, still half hidden behind the apartment door.
A disinterested eye wandered up to meet him. "Whadya want?" Naruto grumbled out, his voice rough and jarring. Shikamaru steeled himself, resolving to get this over with as soon as possible, for both their sakes.
"Can I come in?" Naruto didn't answer, turning on his heel and heading back inside, the door left open behind him. Shikamaru took the lackluster invitation without complaint.
They strode past clean counter tops, an empty sink, and over a spotless floor. All evidence of the bubbly Uzumaki's haphazard style scrubbed and polished away. The front of the apartment had been rendered vacant except for the few books scattered on the kitchen table. He never knew Naruto to own a book, much less read them in his spare time.
“I have chips and some ramen,” Naruto offered, steps stumbling to a halt by one of the farthest cabinets. Shikamaru pondered on the row of ramen stacked in a neat line above it, the packages appearing as though they'd been purchased and forgotten.
Naruto tugged open the cabinet door, studying the bare shelves for far too long before speaking again. “I haven't been home much lately so there's not much else...”
“Chips are great,” he answered, reaching out to accept the offer. Naruto didn't appear to notice, a blank stare gluing his focus straight ahead into nothingness. Shikamaru dropped his hand and shifted back a step.
"Is this a good place to talk?" He raised his voice in a bid to regain his friend's attention.
"We can sit in my room.”
Naruto drifted over to his fridge, opening it and examining its contents before relieving it of its last beverage and continuing his trajectory to the bedroom behind.
Shikamaru found the photo of Jiraiya's code in his back pocket and tugged it loose. Naruto peered back at the movement, and Shikamaru caught a glance of wary recognition before Naruto snapped back around, saying nothing.
The bedroom, in comparison with the rest of the apartment, actually showed signs of life. A pile of clothes tossed on the floor, a partly filled waste bin, and a half zipped up backpack shrugged off by the room's entrance, revealed this had become a mainstay as of late.
Naruto tossed the chips and drink onto a round table by the door and made his way to the far side of the room, collapsing into his bed with a sigh.
Taking the hint, Shikamaru settled in by the table, fingers rubbing the edge of the photograph, gloss sticking to them. Swallowing back a bitter taste, he rapped his fingers on the table to catch Naruto’s wandering focus once more. His effort afforded him little more than a glance of mild curiosity.
Taking the opening, he handed the photo off to Naruto who gingerly accepted it, pulling it closer. Shikamaru settled back, popping open the drink and chips in a show of forced nonchalance, doing his best to give his friend any time and space he might need to think.
No sound, much less words, made an effort to fill the stretching silence and, after a while, the Nara found himself boring a hole into his companion's chest, watching for the rise and fall of breath in the otherwise statue still figure.
Eventually, he forced himself to turn away, instead listening as a nonexistent clock ticked in his ears, marking seconds pouring over into minutes. He fiddled with a chip, the actual contents of the bag left uneaten.
Naruto sat, transfixed on the image held inches from him, his face lacking any sign of recognition or attention. Words itched in Shikamaru's throat, daring him to ask, to prod, to push for any kind of response.
He swallowed them back with a sip of his drink.
Typically, silence wouldn't have bothered him; he acquainted himself with it long ago. It served as a close companion during his many games of Shogi. It aided him in crafting battle strategies, both on the board and in the battlefield. He'd come to appreciate its guidance and insight. It filled time with thought and energy, enticing him with the anticipation of the next move.
It invited him to intuit and counter, to paint in blank spaces with action, with life.
That was not this silence.
This silence harbored despondency and remorse. It brewed regret and pain.
It invited surrender.
This silence ate at Shikamaru, taunting him, demanding a counter.
“Well, does it seem familiar at all?” The question fell flat, and he held back a sigh.
It's not that he didn't understand where Naruto's head might have wandered off to, but in a brutal and practical way it didn't matter. Things kept moving, and a job still needed doing. He had his promise to Asuma to keep, an oath to protect the future of Konoha, a future Pain very much threatened.
Jiraiya's code played a key role in that endeavor.
No matter how much Shikamaru wanted to allow Naruto to indulge in his grief, his concern for his friend didn't outweigh the promises he'd already made. Besides, letting Naruto simmer in gloom any longer wouldn't do him any good either.
“Are you still with me?”
Naruto's blank stare continued on a few moments more before he shook himself out of his stupor. Fitting on a half-hearted smile he stuttered out, "Oh, sorry, sorry! What was that again?"
This wasn't working. He needed to change tactic and yank Naruto out of his daze long enough to at least get a straight answer out of him. Naruto had always required a harsher reality check before things could get through to him, although Shikamaru would have preferred not pouring salt in both their wounds to get it done. Still, he had a mission and a promise to live up to, and in case Naruto had forgotten, so did he.
“All right, come with me,” he huffed out, lifting himself off the floor while gesturing for Naruto to do the same.
Reality cracked into Naruto's smile, spilling over it with confusion, “To where?”
“Just come on,” he ordered. Naruto hesitated before complying, easing himself up with stilted movements. He'd managed to hoist himself halfway, forgotten photo pinned between loose fingers, before Shikamaru noticed the sudden lack of color in his face.
“Wha-” Shikamaru crossed the room in two large strides, “Are you okay?” His hand paused in its attempt to steady Naruto as the blond swatted at him with a dismissive wave. Naruto's face still had that stupid smile plastered on, but it had twisted up until it resembled more of a grimace.
“Give me a minute.”
“Sit down.” He clamped his hand on Naruto's shoulder, urging him back onto the bed.
Naruto leaned into his hold, attempting to keep himself upright. “Just... wait a second.” Even with less than a foot between them, Shikamaru had to strain his ears to catch the request.
“Nope, sit,” he repeated, putting more force into his grip. Naruto all but crumpled back onto the bed.
He waited a few minutes, letting his friend collect himself. “You okay?”
Naruto blinked, confused. Then, as if he forgot he had company, asked “Shikamaru?”
“Yeah,” Shikamaru crouched down as he said it, positioning himself as a barricade in case Naruto tried to stand again.
“I'm sorry. I can't figure it out,” he murmured, and it took Shikamaru working through his own confusion to understand what he meant. The photograph he'd handed to Naruto now lay caged behind tensed fingers, the edge of it pinched into his palm. Wrinkles crawled out from the indents, peaking in ridges across the once smooth surface.
“Don't worry about it,” he said, prying open the rigid fingers enough to tug the photo out from between them. “Do you need to go to the hospital?”
Naruto shook his head.
Wrong answer.
“I really think you should.”
“It's fine,” Naruto insisted, his voice ever so slightly steadier. “I'm fine, you know? But maybe... can we do this another time?”
“Might be a good idea.” Shikamaru situated himself on the floor within arm's reach, relieved to see some of the color returning to his friend's face. “We can just wait here for a bit.”
“I meant…” Naruto rubbed the back of his neck with a sheepish hand, “Maybe we can meet up another day or something?”
Not if he could help it.
“I'll hang out for a bit longer ”
Naruto shook his head again. “Please leave. I'll let you know if I think up anything about the code.”
Shikamaru rooted the palms of his hands firmly on the floor behind himself and fixed Naruto with a stare.
Naruto leaned forward, meeting him with one of his own. “Thanks for stopping by, Shikamaru. We'll catch back up soon.”
Damn it, he's really going to be stubborn about this, isn't he?
“Fine,” he relented, moving to stand, “But let me know if you think of anything, all right?”
“I will.”
He hated to leave the discussion there, but he knew a dead end when he saw one, and he had no intention of wasting time and energy on a lost battle. Besides, if Naruto thought he would be content to leave it at that, then he had no idea just how determined the Nara had become in the time he'd been away.
In fact, he already had a new plan, and reinforcements, in mind.