Brillance?

It wasn't that he was particularly good-looking--he really wasn't--or that he possessed great riches or powers. In fact, he looked a bit like a rat, or maybe a weasel, always pouting—but still, there was something about him.

Maybe it was because she'd never been able to beat him at shogi.

-------------

Konoha always smelled differently to her. Temari sniffed appreciatively, taking in the smells of greens and animals--and along with them the scent of manure--that she always missed back at home. Only at Chiyo's greenhouse could she recall that quality of air, and that, the garden of poisons and herbs, always had a artificial feel to it. It didn't feel genuine.

In fact, the newly appointed Jounin loved the village. Temari actually liked traveling through the thick, often dangerous--not that the wild beasts posed much threat to her--forest that stood between the villages of Sand and Leaf, and she didn't mind the three days that the trip demanded, either. Who knew that she had first come to destroy it? Temari often smiled to herself at that, the desperate past when it had seemed like Sand's survival had depended on the Leaf's destruction. The past when Gaara was blood-mad and insane.

On her back was the giant fan, her favorite weapon, and in her pack she carried the latest of missives between Tsunade and her Kazekage and brother, Gaara. She didn't read the scroll, though either of the kages would not have minded so much, the two villages being at peace and she being the sister of the Kazekage and all. It was official business, and Gaara still stood on shaky footing with some of the older ninja of the village; Temari didn't want to jeopardize what influence Gaara had.

In the distance, she could now make out the walls of the village. Already the smells of Konoha, of meat cooking and rice steaming and wood burning, caught up to her, chasing away the pure green scent of the leaves. Oh well; she'd be coming back through here, anyways.

And besides, she had practiced playing at shogi with Kankuro. He was a master player, though probably not up to Shikamaru's level, and had taught her some tricky manuevers, deceptions that might fool even him. She was looking forward to that.

----------------

The shade curled up around the stump of wood, and Shikamaru narrowed his eyes; the stump suddenly exploded into chunks, as the shade grasped it and conscricted. It was called the Shadow Serpent, and had first been patterned from a giant snake squeezing the life out of a deer. But some of the Nara men called it Gut-Fucker, and Shikamaru preferred that term. It wasn't as pretentious. And it's vulgar sound drove Ino mad.

"I don't speak crazy, homicidal bitch," he muttered to himself. He stretched his arms up over his head. Training was done for the day; he wondered if he should go visit Chouji. Then he groaned, remembering the pile of scrolls that lay inside his room back at the Nara manor, for the upcoming Chuunin exam. Shikamaru had first taken the job of proctoring--and directing the other proctors--figuring that it would be easier then taking on assasination missions, which was what the Nara ninja were famous for. But it turned out that testing little brats was quite a complex task, and added to that were the--

"Choji's fat and you're lazy. You guys might be twins, you know that?"

And the day sunk even lower, and as he turned to face Ino, he caught a glimpse of what she was wearing--oh, God. She was going on a date. With some handsome and unlucky Jounin, no doubt, and he wished that poor fool good luck. Ino was dressed in a sharp gray dress with patterns of cherry blossoms laced up and down and all over the place, like dandelions infesting the lawn. Shikamaru hated it when she came up to him like that. It all led to so much trouble.

"Choji works harder then you," he replied.

"Whatever. You know I was joking! Anyways, I'm going out for--"

"A date," he said. "With a 'handsome young man.' "

"I guess that brain of yours makes up for your lazy butt. Come on! You can't let a lady walk these streets all alone!"

"You're stronger then most of the men in Konoha. Excluding the ninja, that is."

"What if a--"

Shikamaru stepped up, and held up a finger, signaling her to be quiet. "I'll do it," he said. He didn't feel like dragging on this hopeless conversation. As Ino smiled and hugged him, thanking him all the while, he looked at the sky--wondered at all the clouds drifting by.

And her breasts really were soft--

Damn! Where had that come from? Girls are trouble, he told himself. But then, his brillant, 200+ IQ caught up to his--dare I say it--erection and again he admitted to himself what he'd been denying all this time. At least, trying to deny. Ino was freaking hot. And he didn't mind escorting her.

As they walked off, Shikamaru kept his eyes on the road.

--------------

"...And thank you," the Hokage replied. "You wouldn't mind a cup of tea, would you?"

"I'd rather just go," Temari replied, smiling. "I'll come back to pick up the reply tomorrow morning, if that's all right."

"Yeah, that'd be fine." Tsunade yawned and leaned back on her chair. "Man, I'm tired." As Temari watched, the leader of the what was probably the strongest village of shinobi right now took out a roll of scratch-out lottery tickets and began scraping away with the dull head of a kunai knife. "Care for a try?" She asked, tearing out one and handing it to her.

Temari shook her head, smiled, and excused herself. "I really gotta be going."

"Some boy? Tsunade asked, still scratching away at the tickets. When she won nothing, she tossed it carelessly to the wastebasket in the corner of the room; she did this with practice and ease, and Temari knew the Hokage's reputation as a legendary sucker. Bad luck, at least concerning gambling, followed her around like a plague.

"Of course not."

"Of course. Well, get going then. I don't want to keep you from," Tsunade smirked, "your special friend."

"Good luck with those tickets," Temari said, and left.

Tsunade liked the girl--even though she had, technically, tried to tear down Konoha. But that had all been a misunderstanding, a colossal one perhaps, but a misunderstanding nonetheless. Then her eyes caught something strange. As she scraped away at a ticket, she realized that the three dango sticks were in a diagonal row--shit, she thought, as she looked at the prize, I won twenty thousand.

This was bad. Shizune would have to be told. But then, a whole roll remained...

---------------

"Out on a date?" Kiba asked, as they sat in the ramen stand.

"No." Shikamaru slurped up some noodles, along with a bit of sliced pork, as he watched Ino hug and be hugged quite unappropriately by her date. He was some blond-haired jackass--no, that was stupid, he didn't know that person very well and so he shouldn't make snap judgements--but that smile reminded him stupendously of no one else but Naruto. A toothpick or something stuck out between the Jounin's lips.

"For a guy just hanging around, you look awfully territorial."

"Thanks, Dog-Face."

Dog-Face smirked. "Well, she is kinda hot."

"Kinda?"

"I say kinda because I've seen what she can do when she feels like it. Man, that's must've sucked when she took your body over and stuck it inside the outhouse with--"

"Shut up," Shikamaru replied, irritated. "And what are you doing here?"

"I'm on a date," Kiba said. "And I'm not afraid to say so, either."

"With who? She probably smells like a dog..."

"Which is perfectly fine. And-- ah, there he is."

The 'he' in question was Akamaru. Shikamaru remembered when the dog had been just a tiny little pup, and now, as the giant white dog strolled past and licked Kiba's hand absently, he again felt the passage of time. Well, sort of; time best displayed itself, at least in his eyes, in the growth of the genin he had known. Kiba, Shino, Hinata, Ino, Choji, Neji, Lee and Tenten; there was Sakura too, though he didn't see much of her, and then there was Sasuke--long gone--and Naruto--also gone, but only temporarily.

And Ino definitely displayed growth in certain areas along her body--

"Damn pervert," he muttered to himself. Whether it was for himself or that Jounin--he was hugging Ino far too closely for comfort--was debatable.

"You know," Kiba then said, "she probably likes you."

"I know," Shikamaru replied--and that was the problem. He recognized just why she asked him to 'escort' her out so much. And he didn't want that, not at all; he preferred Ino as a friend, a hot one, but just a friend nonetheless.

"So why don't you just go for it?"

"She's not so good at shogi," Shikamaru said.

"What?" Kiba looked incredulous. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Look: I know that most of the Chuunin just think of sex all the time--at least, the ones I've seen. If that was all I wanted, I'd ask out Ino, 'kay? But when things get serious--"

"That's what condoms are there for," said Kiba.

Shikamaru sighed; it was no use talking to Kiba. And as he sulked, the Dog-Face met his date (she really did smell like a dog) and happily went off with her, Akamaru trotting behind his heels.

Ino really did suck at shogi. But, as he pondered that, Shikamaru wondered if he was just using her inept game-playing to hide his true feelings. He'd seen others do that, and knew that it was stupid. But then--no. He couldn't truly, absoutely respect anyone so bad at playing the chess-game. And if he couldn't respect her like that, if he couldn't respect her the way he did his father, then there was no use in any further involvement.

Sighing again, Shikamaru walked off, hands tucked into his pockets. He never saw Ino peering at his retreating back.

-----------------

"So where is he..." Temari peered in at the little house, the one she knew belonged to the Nara clan. This was one of the small hovels maintained for the use of coming-of-age ninjas seeking some privacy; it was also used as a place for detention. Shikamaru lived here, perhaps finding solace in the quiet.

She looked inside. A shogi board, with it's pieces in process of being played; a bedroll; a whetstone and some ninja weaponry; and junk lying heaped in one dark corner, knick-knacks that he hadn't bothered to clean up. He really is a lazy bum, she thought.

Then she turned around, hearing someone walk up to the house. It was him--Shikamaru.

"What are you here for?" He asked her, a little smile playing around his lips. "You finally begging for a date?"

"Screw that," she replied. "I'm here for a rematch. A payback."

"Your brother, eh? Kankuro--I wonder how good he is..." With that, he moved past her and into the hut. He rearranged the pieces. "Whatever; you've never won so far, not in the last two years."

"You'll see," Temari said, and sat before the board, unslinging her fan from her back. "First move?"

"Ladies first..."

A/N: Well, I hope I didn't treat Ino too harshly. I tried to provide a love-triangle thing that isn't skewed from the start. The key word being 'tried,' I suppose. I hope you enjoyed this part--the next will be up soon, and that will hopefully be the end of this little series. Then I'm going to start on something very EPIC. Yeah!