#a situation where sakura is already getting shafted AND i have to do the work on the other character to bring them up to snuff too

[vaultsixtynine]

my sakusai agenda is immense

[vannahfanfics]

Lucid Dream

Category: Hurt and Comfort, Romantic Fluff

Fandom: Naruto

Characters: Shikamaru Nara, Sakura Haruno

EDIT: This beautiful piece of artwork was made by the lovely @deliathedork​ who just can’t seem to stop spoiling me rotten with all the presents! TT.TT Please give her some love too! She is very, very talented!

Bonjour, mes amis! Here’s today’s story for ShikaSaku Week Hanami, prompt “Drip, Drip, Drip (Our Blood). For some reason I really like writing in Shikamaru’s POV… Anyway, enjoy~

Drip. Drip. Drip.

The slow, melodic sound was the first thing to greet Shikamaru as he phased into consciousness. His vision rolled as he forced his eyes open but could only manage to part his eyelids into a small slit for the overwhelming nausea that engulfed him upon doing so. Eyelashes fluttering like a trembling leaf as he struggled to keep his eyes open and survey his surroundings and current situation, the water kept dripping. Drip. Drip. Drip. Dust was dancing in thin brown clouds all around him. It was dark save for a few spearing shafts of light pouring down from large, gaping holes in the ceiling.

A ceiling- he was in a building, or what was left of it. Chunks of the wall and roof were littered around him in great heaping gobs of crushed stone, with little pebbles and normal-sized rocks scattered around like their voluminous brood. Glass intermingled with the carnage, glowing with sheen as they reflected the harsh sunlight invading the dark space. Shikamaru turned his head to his left, though the muscles in his neck and shoulders screamed loudly in protest, to find a cavernous expanse stretching out just beside him. The floor- and the three stories underneath- lie far below in an indistinct collection of rubble. Illuminated by the sunlight below, a large red puddle bloomed on the smooth surface of one of the rock faces, a lake of blood that splintered off into many rivers that meandered into the cracks.

Drip. Another bead of blood bloomed on the tip of his finger from where his arm was slung carelessly into the void, then detached itself to fall down, down, down and splash into the puddle below. Blood. His blood, to be exact. It was a lot. How was he bleeding so much?

The spike of twisted metal embedded through his lower abdomen provided that answer. The jade green of his vest was dyed a dark brown where the blood had seeped into the thick fabric. He shifted slightly and could feel the sticky mass of blood squelching against his backside, traveling all the way down his left leg. The stretch of floor that he was laying on was sloped downwards and to the left, allowing the blood to run up his body, catch on his left arm, and pool on his hand before gravity stole it away.

“Well, shit,” he wheezed. His right arm twitched as he tried to move it, but the muscles were hesitant to comply at first. Slowly, he eased his arm up; his right hand shook violently that it made tremors wrack all the way up to his shoulder. Somehow, he wrapped his hand around the spear of metal that was jutting out of his stomach and gave it an experimental tug. All he earned himself was shooting pain blooming like flower petals from the epicenter of his wound; his head smacked back against the concrete as he hissed loudly in agony. That certainly wasn’t budging. It was probably his luck that the metal was worked into the concrete and had bent upon the building collapsing, and he had landed right on top of it. Pulling it out was counter-productive anyway; he would bleed out almost instantaneously. Shikamaru’s eyebrows threaded together as he fought to remember how he had ended up in such a drag in the first place.

The memories threaded like beads of dew on a spiderweb, spaced far apart but no less interconnected; he recalled something about raiding a suspected drug cartel compound. He tugged at the thread in his mind, hoping that all the dew beads would merge to form a coherent series of events. Green eyes and pink hair suddenly clouded him memories. Sakura, that’s right, he was with Sakura in the fifth-floor raid party; to catch the enemy unawares, they had planned to attack every floor at once to keep those on the upper floors from barricading themselves in or utilizing a secret escape route. It had been going all fine and dandy until some nutjob had decided to strap a bunch of paper bombs to himself to become a martyr. They had been in far too close quarters for the both of them to escape, and Shikamaru’s brightest idea at the time had been to wrench Sakura out of the window then dive for the stairs. The paper bombs had exploded and the floor had collapsed, and apparently, Shikamaru had ended up here.

Drip. Drip. Drip. The blood continued to accumulate in the rubble below.

Sakura… Is she okay? The girl was by no means a slouch, but she probably hadn’t expected to be flung off the fifth floor of a building, either. Shikamaru ought to be concerned with himself, but his thoughts were bent on the medical ninja. He could’ve killed her, really. He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if that were the case. Of all the things, that stupid set of decisions? He should’ve reacted faster. There were any number of alternate scenarios that could’ve unfolded, but that had been the one he had opted for. God, he was an idiot. If she did live, he almost hoped he did die to spare himself the beating he was sure to catch later.

Wow. He was actually acting like he was going to make it out of this alive. His vision, already fuzzing black around the edges, settled once more on the sharp metal bit jutting out of his abdomen. Shikamaru felt bile rise up in the back of his throat as he felt the acidic tang of fear beginning to flood his mouth. His grip tightened around the iron, as if his hand alone could shatter it. Waves of tingling numbness began to course over his body, head to toe. Then there was that goddamned dripping. Drip. Drip. Drip. It pulsed loudly in his eardrums like tinnitus, sending spikes of pain shooting into his skull with each accursed drop. He didn’t want to die. It’s not like Shikamaru was the biggest go-getter, but still, there were things he wanted to accomplish in life before kicking the bucket. He had to see Naruto become Hokage. More than that, he had to be that dumbass’s advisor, because he sure didn’t trust anyone else to do it. God, even though it was a drag, he wanted to get married, maybe have a kid or two, watch them grow up… Maybe, then, maybe he could die- but not right now. Not yet.

Sakura.

Maybe the blood loss was making him delirious. He was trying to keep his breath from coming in ragged, shallow gasps, because the faster he breathed, the faster the blood pumped through his veins, and the faster his blood began to drip. Drip. Drip. Drip. Drip. Drip. Had it sped up? How long had it been since the building collapsed? One minute? Ten? How close was he to death, actually?

Sakura.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

Girls were a drag. Shikamaru had always thought so. Seeing Ino and Sakura butt heads like fighting mountain goats was enough to solidify that in his brain. Yet… Somehow they had become less of a drag, over time. Especially her. Especially Sakura. He admired her, even. She was a bit feisty, but he preferred that to a total giggly fake pushover. She was smart, so he could hold intelligent conversation with her. She was strong, stupidly so, which meant Shikamaru never had to worry. Of course he hadn’t hurt her throwing her out of the building. It was Sakura, after all. She probably hurt the ground rather than the other way around.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

He was definitely delirious. His vision swam like swirling water before his hazy eyes. He didn’t even have the strength to hold his head up any more. One minute? Ten? It felt like a lifetime. He was definitely delirious, because he was regretting not telling her that he loved her. When did that happen? They hung out, sure. They were often paired on missions because they worked well together. He’d walked her home after they went out to dinner a couple times, but that was just work stuff. Friend stuff, if he was being generous.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

Did he think about her sometimes? Sure, but his mind just wandered like that. Wandered, to her pink hair like the cherry blossoms in bloom, to her spring green eyes that sparkled like a beautiful sea they had seen once in a mission out of the country, to her beautiful smile that shone like the sun itself. He had to be delirious, because he could see her before his waking eyes, calling his name with tears in those eyes like new spring growth.

“Shikamaru! Shikamaru, can you hear me?”

Was she actually there? Was she an illusion? Shikamaru really couldn’t tell. Everything around her was a smudge of indistinct grays and blacks and browns with those burning streaks of white light, yet she was so crisp and clear. His eyes settled on an abnormality, on the trail of bright red blood streaming down the side of her face from a gash in her forehead. Was that his fault? It traveled down her cheek, mixing with her pouring tears, down to her chin, where it beaded like a red jewel and dropped down onto his vest. Drip. Drip. Drip.

“Sakura… You’re… Bleeding…” Was that his voice? It sounded so garbled, like a frog croaking. His whole body was numb at this point, and the only point he knew that he had actually lifted up his hand was when it appeared in his line of sight. His trembling thumb gently swept over the thin laceration as his expression contorted into one of regret. “Sorry…”

“What? This? No, no, this is nothing!” Maybe it was his imagination, but she seemed to lean into his touch, cheek brushing into his palm. “Shikamaru, you saved me. I would have died in that explosion if you hadn’t pushed me out of the way.” His mouth twisted into a pitiful rendition of a smile. She wasn’t mad. No beating for him. He was finally catching a stroke of luck. That lovely pink hair of her whirled as she whipped her head around to shout at Naruto and Kiba, who were finally ascending the half-broken stairs to assist her.

“Sakura, you shouldn’t have run up the stairs like that! They’re all half-collapsed, believe it! We almost died!”

“Yeah, like, three times.”

“Shut up and help me!” Her voice was high-pitched, nearly manic. The tone demanded their will to comply. Shikamaru’s breath was rattling in his lungs now. It felt like it was water he was breathing, not oxygen, heavy and suffocating. He could vaguely hear the two boys suck in horrified gasps when they neared him, and Sakura vaguely instructing them to hold him still as she bent off the end of the pole. She stood over him, one foot on either side of his hips, while Naruto crouched down at his head to push his palms into his chest. Sakura grasped the end of the pole and charged her fists with chakra, and then bent the piece of metal as close as she dare to the gaping hole that was his wound.

The vibrations alone were enough to send Shikamaru’s legs to spasming, and Kiba had to dive on them to keep him from accidentally kicking her away. Short pained cries left his mouth, dignity ignored. It of course didn’t snap immediately; she had to bend it back and forth, working weakness into the metal until it finally broke, snapping off in a jagged point just above his heaving belly. “Shikamaru, this is going to hurt like hell.”

“Wha- AAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGH!” he howled as the three of them all but jerked him off the remaining short spike of metal. The barbed end ripped through his flesh with fervor, sending more blood spurting into the air and his vision flaring white as he fought desperately against fainting. His entire body burned like he was being submerged in lava, but especially that small circle of agony in his lower abdomen. As soon as they had him on the ground again, Sakura was straddling his waist with her hands pressed deep into his wound, dying them a dark red that he could even see through the hemisphere of green healing chakra; his body continued to twitch with lingering tendrils of fiery pain wracking his nervous system. He was wheezing as his wide eyes attempted to fixate on her trembling form but failing miserably as they danced with white and black spots. He could feel the light tremors against his body. Her tears continued to flow, gathering on the end of her chin to splash down below.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

“S-Saku… ra… I…”

“No. Don’t you do that,” she growled at him. Her green eyes, alight with furious fire, snapped up to meet his. “You’re not dying. Not here. Not like this. I won’t let you.” He couldn’t help but allow the tired smirk to form on his lips. So angry all the time. It was amazing how much roiling rage was pent up in that petite body.

His hand was moving again. It settled in her threads of disheveled pink hair, tucking it behind her ear. “Stop moving. It makes this harder,” she ordered, but with much less bark. Shikamaru ignored her, going to tug on the neck of her shirt to get her attention. “What?” What he mumbled, she could not here. A faint tinge of pink arose to her cheeks, but whether that was from embarrassment or ire, she wasn’t sure. She shifted such that she was now kneeling by his side, allowing her to both continue administering medical ninjutsu to his wound and leaning close to his face. “What did you say?”

“Just in case,” he wheezed in a hoarse laugh, and with the last of his strength, he pushed his head up so he could press a light kiss to her lips. He actually managed to hold it for a few seconds before his head smacked back down to the concrete. She stared owlishly down at him for a few seconds more. She would probably still hit him even in his condition for pulling a stunt like that, but hey. “Don’t look at me like that,” he simpered weakly. “You’re not one to deny a dying man his first kiss, are you?” A trail of blush blazed across her cheeks like a sudden wildfire.

“Idiot,” she grumbled, looking back down to his wound. “You think I’m going to let you die now…?” He quirked his eyebrow at her soft features. Was that a smile he saw? He would’ve thought she would be angry. He yelped loudly when she suddenly applied more pressure to his abdomen. “Idiot! I’m gonna heal this stupid wound of yours so I can kill you myself! Jeez, men, can’t even handle a scratch before they start getting weird ideas in their head!” she raged loudly, and in tandem, her green chakra flared all the brighter and became bubbly and unfocused around the edges. He sputtered out apologies as the force of her fists against his stomach literally bent his spine and forced him to sit up a little.

“Yeesh, Sakura,” Naruto frowned at her. “I thought it was kinda romantic, actually…”

“Yeah, if I was a girl, I’d swoon,” Kiba agreed with his arms crossed.

“Shut up! You two want some of this?! Why don’t you go and make yourself useful with the clean-up effort before they’re washing your blood off the walls!” The two followed her advice and made a hasty retreat. She began muttering under her breath about their incompetency, which made him chuckle slightly. He soon regretted that, because it flared that flower of pain in his belly again.

“Ouch…”

“That was reckless,” she scolded him quietly. It took him a second to register that he was referring to his abomination of a strategy earlier.

“I know. I probably could’ve come up with something better if I had been thinking straight.” He could talk in longer sentences now without gasping for air, so he supposed his chances of dying were now slimmer.

“You? Not thinking straight?”

“I was too busy thinking about how I didn’t want you to die.” Her mouth folded in on itself as she blushed darker. She looked away, likely because she was embarrassed for him to see. A long period of silence unfolded between them, a book with blank pages. Shikamaru wasn’t sure of what he wanted to write there. Perhaps it didn’t need to be written at all.

“You…” she sighed, looking back to him finally as she removed her hands from his abdomen. “I’ve stopped the bleeding and sealed the wound shut, but it’s only a temporary fix. You need surgery. Move too much and you’ll bust it open again.”

“Moving too much? Doesn’t sound like me.”

“You could have died!” she shouted at him suddenly. Despite what he had just said, he flinched violently, and his hand shot to the half-closed wound as it snarled in protest. His eyebrows were knitted together as he stared up at her face, twisted in agony and regret. “You could’ve died,” she repeated, more softly, “and I don’t know what I would’ve done if you had.” She hung her head. He watched those tears, tinged pink with the blood still leaking from her forehead cut, drip down onto her lap. Drip. Drip. Drip.

He clenched his teeth tightly, forcing himself up onto his elbows, then pushing off to unsteadily pull himself into a sitting position. He slung his arms loosely around the crying girl, half in a consoling embrace and half in a gesture to ensure he didn’t fall right back down. He pushed his head into hers, his dark black strands weaving with those lovely pink ones.

“But I didn’t,” he breathed into her scalp, “because you saved me.” He felt her shaking hands screw into the fabric of the back of his vest as she held onto him tightly. Her face was buried into his shoulder, smearing it with blood and tears and low sobs.

Surely, he was no longer delirious.

He slipped his hand under her head to grasp her gently by the chin, lifting up her face. Somehow, it was possible for her to still be incredibly beautiful, even with her face smeared with dirt and smudged with blood and her expressed scrunched up into misery. Those bright green eyes peeked out at him through thick, tear-heavy lashes. “You saved me,” he repeated comfortingly. Her eyes flickered a few times before falling to his lips. Her gaze rested there for a moment.

“Just in case.” Her voice was like a breath among howling wind, nearly inaudible. She closed her eyes as she leaned into kiss him. This time, her lips molded fully into his, and he relished how soft and pliant they felt under his. With a hunger he had never known, he devoured her in passionate, starving kisses, pushing against her such that she had to brace herself with her palms flat against the concrete, back bent at a dramatic angle. His were holding her face in place as he kissed her fervently, over and over and over until both their mouths were sore and bruised. That ache in him wasn’t even close to being filled, but he forced himself to pull back regardless, mostly because his head was beginning to swim again. He laughed breathily as his forehead fell into her shoulder, and her arms jumped up to wrap around his broad back.

“Rest,” she cajoled him. “I’ll be here when you wake up.”

“When I wake up, will this all have been some sort of twisted lucid dream?” he laughed wryly.

“No,” she laughed and pressed a kiss into the top of his head. “Not a dream.” Shikamaru decided to take that at face value and practically melted into her, allowing all of his muscles to finally relax. As he breathed in air, Sakura’s scent wafted in with it, a blend of strawberries and cream and the fresh spring breeze.

Even if he never woke up, he was pretty content with going out this way, held in the arms of the woman he daresay he loved while the sunlight warmed his back… Of course, it would be nice if he did wake up, lucid dream or not.

After all, there was a lot he still had left to do… Marry a girl, maybe have a kid or two, watch them grow up… retire to a home in the countryside, with cherry blossoms blooming in the brilliance of spring, and be greeted every morning by that smile that rivaled the glow of the very sun.

Enjoy this oneshot? Feel free to peruse my Table of Contents!

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