Chapter Text
On a mission with Sakura, Shikamaru watches her lay a genjutsu on a young chūnin they captured which tortured him for hours until he gave up the vital information to end their mission successfully without any more damage to them. He and Sakura were fifteen. The chūnin couldn't have been more than three or four years older than her, but Shikamaru looked away while Sakura paid close attention until it was finally over and Sakura stood and went over to him and slit his throat neatly with a kunai. Then she relayed the necessary information to Shikamaru to allow him to formulate a strategy. It was her only kill on the mission. Shikamaru killed one ninja and badly injured two others, and yet he is the one who is unable to sleep on the way back to the village. Sakura, who is taking first watch, looks over at him.
"Can't sleep?" she asks, with one of her gentle smiles, her luminous green eyes concerned.
"I'll be fine," Shikamaru says, and rolls over in his bedroll. He rubs his temples where a headache is beginning to form. One of the enemy hit him on the head with some kind of earth jutsu. At least, that's his excuse. The screams from their prisoner are embedded into his skull, and Shikamaru can't close his eyes without seeing that neat line of red that followed Sakura's kunai.
"I could put you to sleep until it's your turn for watch," Sakura adds. Her hands are raised to perform the simple genjutsu, and Shikamaru flinches away. "I'll be fine, Sakura," he says quickly, to try and cover it up. Shinobi notice everything. She saw the movement, but she ignores it and casts her eyes back to the dark forest.
"Okay," she says brightly, and climbs the side of the nearest tree trunk before he can order her to. He is technically her commander on this mission, but Sakura has been moving so efficiently he hasn't needed to give her a single order.
Shikamaru shuts his eyes and determinedly thinks about home and how short a time it'll be before he sees Chouji and Ino again.
Whenever it's his turn for watch, he pays attention to Sakura's resting form. He sees that she doesn't sleep the entire night.