#shikasakuhanami: day one

[shikasaku-week]

Happy ShikaSaku Week!

this week’s theme: beauty in habits // the joy of daily life

DAY ONE the cluttered kitchen table tag: Team as Family

Rules: use the text prompt and create a work that falls under the provided tag.

Tag #shikasakuhanami2021 and @ us at shikasaku-week so we can find your works and share them!

Some graphics you can use during the week:

[the-formerone]

shikasakuhanami 2019: day 3

me, strollin in late w the shikasaku content

a pretty (empty) smile on ao3!

"I want him dead," she sobs, face buried in his chest, her palms fisted tightly in the thin fabric of his kimono. "Dead!"

She almost shrieks it, and Shikamaru has to hush her sobbing. He rubs his palms gently up and down her arms. She hiccups, which turns into a wet, pitiful cough, and then she slumps against him, exhausted.

Shikamaru lets their combined weight take them to the ground, and he makes space for the emperor's newest wife between his legs. Shikamaru is a lord himself. He knows better than to have a woman this important touching him the way Sakura is touching him, confiding in him the way Sakura has.

But he's also been nameless from birth, his clan's final act to preserve the Nara by wiping away their name, then sending the nameless into the new Uchiha court. The Senju had brought the Nara to great esteem during their reign; the Uchiha regarded them as too insightful, and had purged them. Shikaku had been lost; Yoshino, squirreled out of the palace herself, had left behind with a distant cousin, a young Shikamaru, and very detailed instructions.

Sakura was a country doctor's daughter, whose brilliance had won her scholarship to learn medicine. She had been a brilliant student of Senju Tsunade's before the purge, and after it, a disciple of Orochimaru. Her brilliance had blossomed blackly after that, tainted with Orochimaru's own wickedness and the darker still plans of the Uchiha.

She had been thrown in the emperor's way almost by accident. She was a dear friend of one of the emperor's great nephews; his only lover had chosen banishment with the remaining living Senju, and Uchiha Sasuke had demanded amnesty for his last remaining childhood friend.

She had gotten a better place than that. And much higher esteem. But she had been torn away from her only companion, and thrust into the kind of court life she had never been trained for.

Shikamaru pitied her. At least he had Ino, who had raised him, and through her, his mother. Sakura didn't have anyone now. The only reason Shikamaru had befriended her in the first place was because of a wound he had sustained on the property before the coup.

Their bond had been tenuous before it. After, Shikamaru was right to guess that he was Sakura's only lifeline.

"Hush," he says, soothing her as best as he can.

The last of her sobs leave her body, and Shikamaru is sure a face's worth of expensive make-up has ruined his simple attire. He focuses instead on plucking at some of her more pointy ornaments, and carefully letting down her hair.

The emperor would have him whipped for being in his wife's chamber, but Shikamaru would take the beating. She had looked so distraught when he first entered. Nevermind that she had summoned him after sundown.

They could always say he had brought her a book. There were enough recent additions to her suites to make the lie seem more true.

"No treason before bedtime, okay?" he asks, holding her face in his hands, rubbing his thumb over her cheek.

Her green eyes are puffy with tears, but she looks less bleak than she did when he arrived. He wonders how long she paced her room like the wildcat she is, tearing at her bedposts and throwing things around until a suitable amount of time had passed between the emperor's leaving and Shikamaru's summoning.

Sakura was not as fragile as she looked, and she looked like a young dove; all dark skin from her childhood in the country turned soft with her late days at court. Her callouses would have been gone by now if the emperor did not prefer his surgeon wife be able to work, that she could be more of a zoo attraction than an actual partner.

She hated the idea, had spat it out as soon as Shikamaru came into the room. 'I'm a doctor and he keeps me caged up like a doll,' she hissed. 'He is sustaining a war and I should be helping people, but he holds me here because he knows I hate it, but that I have no other options. He is wicked. He is wicked.'

"Treason," Sakura says, nodding her head, insisting. The pale purple diamond tattooed on her forehead at the end of her training with Tsunade is usually covered these days, painted black or navy or red out of respect for the Uchiha. It is usually the first bit of make up Sakura scrapes off when she is in private. Today, the skin under the diamond has gone red with Sakura rubbing at it. "Let's do treason," she whispers.

Shikamaru laughs, and busses her nose against hers.

"We will," he says.

"When?"

He shrugs.

"Soon."

"How soon?"

He breathes out slowly through his nose.

"I want to help you do it."

Shikamaru leans away from her. Sakura frowns.

"You know I can't let you - ,"

"Don't treat me like a child, you know what I'm capable of - ,"

"Sakura, this isn't about your education - ,"

"It's about the country - ,"

"You can't be a part of it, Konoha - ,"

She slams her hand over his mouth, so quickly and with so much force, he bites his cheek so hard it bleeds. He curses, jumping with the pain, but Sakura's face is deadly serious through the assault.

"Do not," she says, voice low, "call me that."

Shikamaru raises his hands slowly. He lays his hands on top of Sakura's, and slowly pries her hand off his mouth.

He says her married name, "Konohasakuya-hime," deliberately, and watches her fume as he does it. "You know why you can't."

Because she can't be found guilty of murder if Uchiha Madara is deposed by his great nephews, Uchiha Itachi and Uchiha Sasuke. The only ones by rights allowed to take his blood are the Senju, and his own family. Sakura would upset the balance of their culture if she meddled in such a way, even if only an intimate few knew about it.

No. History would not treat her kindly if she did what she was so desperate to do. But if Sakura wanted to survive a second transition of power, she needed to be innocent of violent crime, and therefore, still eligible to marry Itachi or Sasuke when they ruled, and returned the Senju to power.

It was out of her hands for her own protection. The plan had been crafted as soon as the Senju were fully aware of every potential casualty of returning fire. The still named Nara that were working with the Senju were meticulous; they even had plans for the innocent Uchiha in the palace. Sakura was one of the few who was aware of the plan the Senju and Nara had made for her, and that was only because she had wrestled it out of Shikamaru.

"You know why," Shikamaru repeats. And even though Sakura's grip crumples, the fire in her eyes doesn't. Shikamaru is well aware that this argument isn't even close to over. If Sakura can be counted on for anything, it's her fighting spirit.

She sniffs hard, and that's it. She doesn't nod, doesn't blink to let him know she's heard his verdict. She's stubborn that way. Shikamaru runs his thumb over her cheek again, then presses his lips to the purple diamond on her forehead.

Her hand slides down low, slips between the skirt of his kimono, and finds the warm skin of his inner thigh.

"Will you give me his head?" she asks, voice dipping low.

He turns his head down, presses his cheek against the side of her forehead, breathes in the soft jasmine smell of her hair. Her fingers brush the soft skin on the underside of his cock, and it twitches in interest.

"I want his blood," she murmurs, turning her face so that the hot air of her mouth billows against the curve of Shikamaru's throat. She scratches the skin of his inner thigh, presses her teeth to a tendon in his throat, closes in on him all at once. "I want him dead."

"You'll have it," he replies, hips arching up, seeking her touch, and he sucks in a breath when her soft wet mouth finds his.

(This strange part of her, this sudden change that overcame her from time to time, was part of why she could not be involved in the coup. It was also part of why she would win her way into it, and history together.)

[shikasaku-week]

Day One: the rusty end of a blade

Saturday, March 23, 2019

Welcome to Day One and thank you in advance for your participation in ShikaSaku Hanami 2019.

Remember to tag your submissions with #shikasakuhanami or @shikasaku-week to help us find it.

We welcome all transformative works!

Ship/character bashing and/or harassment will result in being banned this event and any future events as well as being reported for harassment.

Please remember to leave feedback on the works that you interact with. Likes, replies and reblogs, as well as stopping by to let artists and authors know you’re enjoying their works create connections and community, and help keep our ship alive and thriving!

You can find the prompts for the rest of the week here.

[shikasaku-week]

ShikaSaku Week Hanami 2019

SHIKASAKU WEEK HANAMI 2019

When:

March 23rd-March 29th

Where:

• you can post anywhere! Tumblr, AO3, FF.net, DA, Twitter, go wild! • please send us a link to your fanwork so we can add it to a masterpost for everyone to see! • tag it with #shikasakuhanami or @shikasaku-week to help us find it

How:

• the only requirement is for ShikaSaku to be the main pairing in your fanwork. It can be a fic, a fanart, a fanvid, a gifset, an edit, it’s up to you! • you can find the prompt list on the blog, or on this post

Important note regarding the adult ban:

• adult content is allowed and welcome • fuck tumblr • a collection on AO3 will be created specifically for you to post your adult content so that it can’t be banned or shit like that

Please, no character bashing. We’re here to promote a ship, not ruin other people’s day.

PROMPT LIST:

DAY ONE the rusty end of a blade

DAY TWO you wake at dusk

DAY THREE closed doors and empty smiles

DAY FOUR ashamed of the thing you become

DAY FIVE finger to the wrist

DAY SIX (also Sakura’s birthday) the long stretch of history

DAY SEVEN spinning dizzy

Have fun and share it around! We deserve more content for our rarepair ♥

[the-formerone]

shikasakuhanami 2019: day 2

soft content! get your soft content, fresh off the presses!

for day 2's prompt, you wake at dusk

my wandering days (are all i have) on ao3!

Sakura wakes at dusk these days. Gets up from her bedroll and cracks her back first thing in the 'morning'. She rolls over onto her knees, then to her feet, and does a few simple kata to warm herself up for the day. Then, she has at it.

They stopped in Mist for a while sometime after Sakura's thirty-fifth birthday. Shikana had been all but raised there, and didn't remember anywhere else on their travels, except for when the wandering bug bit Sakura, and she whisked her daughter away to Shikkotsu, or to the seal on Naruto's little cottage on an inlet just off Uzushio, where he said she was always welcome if she wanted home without the burden of it.

She started the women's night school in Mist because she wanted to. She told Mei what her plans were, and the Mizukage happily shoved the funds needed and the women interested Sakura's way. Sakura foisted the paperwork on Shikamaru, who settled quite well into being an administrator (all things considered), while Sakura spent her evenings teaching kunoichi and civilian women ancient and modern medicines.

She had taught village doctors and healers all around the elemental nations on their travels after she had gotten all of the gambling out of her system. Helping the next person, or town along just seemed like the natural thing to do. Before, their only plan was to win at every bar, tavern, or casino Tsunade had lost at on her own travels. Now, the journey picked them instead.

Sakura had seen more of the world at thirty-five than she ever thought she would have when she was nineteen, drunk, and brave enough to fill out the paperwork requesting leave. Her shishou had put her request on pending, which gave Sakura an intermediary-protection status that ensured she was still a shinobi of Konoha, but not currently affiliated with the village. Kakashi had kept her file on pending, and so had Naruto.

It had been hardest for Naruto to wrap his head around why she needed to leave. But when Sai (and Yamato. And Kakashi. And Sasuke) had reminded him that he and Sasuke had already had their great adventures outside of the village, he understood. Sakura needed her own great big adventure. It had just lasted a lot longer than anyone had expected it to.

She doesn't know if she ever plans on coming back. If she ever plans on allowing Haruno Shikana to become a Nara, and heir of her clan the way the Nara elders keep pestering Shikamaru. She doesn't know if she wants to trade the good that she does out here for the good she can do inside the village walls. Out here, Sakura sees the people she helps. She makes tangible differences in people's lives.

And what's more, she isn't beholden to anyone. Not even Shikamaru. She could gather Shikana in her arms and leave him at a moment's notice, and he would look for her and find her, and let her stay gone, just because he knew her that well.

But she doesn't want to leave. She wants to pad quietly through their cheap apartment, and kiss her sleeping daughter on the forehead. She wants to open the door a moment before Shikamaru's key taps the lock, to welcome him home through the front door. She wants to heat up the left-overs she took out of the freezer to thaw, so they can share a meal together as his day ends, and before hers begins.

Tomorrow, or even the day after that, this life in Mist could end as abruptly as it began. Sakura has trained up a good number of doctors, and Shikamaru has learned to draft contingency plans for one of Sakura's flights of fancy; if they go, the night school, and the new doctors in Mist would all be just fine.

Now, Sakura says, "Welcome home," with the dusk-light slatting warm and bright over her face, piercing through the mist just so Shikamaru can smile, and wonder how she can be so lovely as he says, "I'm back."

[the-formerone]

shikasakuhanami 2019: day 4

 ashamed of the thing you become

hello i’m four days late but here, have some apocalypse angst! @shikasaku-week

the thing you become on ao3!

She stands at the summoning circle, one foot in, the other foot out, her blood not spilled, and therefore she is safe. Her hands hold the man by the neck; he lays over her lap, docile and immobile as an infant. She even hums to him, a little bit. A song Shikamaru remembers from when the world was still the world. 

Shikamaru is ready, his head resting on the top tooth of Hidan's scythe. The middle one had been lost when Shikamaru tried to dig it up in those early days. Any discarded weapon was a good one. The whole of the earth was teeming with White Zetsus to do Kaguya's bidding, rooting out coves of nature chakra hiding in human beings and sacred places.

They kill people. They always have. That shouldn't be what sticks in Shikamaru's craw. Somehow, it does anyway.

They try to follow a code. It's as close as they can get to a nindo these days. There were humans that collaborated with White Zetsus, hoping to get better treatment in the Infinite Tsukuyomi for their deeds. The White Zetsu didn't tell them they would have gotten their hearts desires anyway. They'd be fools to turn away volunteer spies that would turn into volunteer food for their mother.

Still. They have been doing this for an awful long time. Years, it must have been by now. Decades more like. And here they are, still looking as vibrant and daisy fresh as they did the day their world was plunged into nothing.

Shikamaru does not remember time. He remembers blood. And Sakura.

She steals this man's chakra from his body, though there isn't much for her to gather from him. The samurai were hard to find, and so were the spiritually enlightened. Disciplined civilians and non-combatants were always the more likely to have under-developed chakra pathways, but plenty of chakra itself.

He waits for the moment when her eyes flash up to him, when the seal on her forehead will flicker from black to purple again. When she does, he drags his throat down the blade of Hidan's scythe — beheads himself.

Shikamaru catches his head by the ponytail before it hits the ground. Sakura lifts an eyebrow at the display.

"You're getting lazy."

Shikamaru rolls his eyes, and breaks the summoning circle. The sound of distant horses, the roar of battle that always vibrates in the back of his brain calms. Jashin was a strange and old god who spoke in whispers, but with this sacrifice, he would be sated.

"You're getting tired," he replies, carefully attaching his head to his neck. He's done it so many times it's like second nature, but that's mostly because he knows if he put his head on wrong, Sakura would never help him set it back right. She'd be too busy laughing at him for the next seventy-six years.

"It's not easy being this beautiful," Sakura huffs, and rises to her feet.

Shikamaru knows for a fact that it isn't. The trick to Tsunade's everlasting youth could only be taken steps forward by an apprentice that needed to survive so she could set the world to rights when she knew how to do it. Stealing an entire tenketsu system's worth of chakra from a person in one pull could fuel the body rather than Sakura's own chakra.

Shikamaru made a deal with a demon so he could help her. There were worse bargains to make. He's in his nineties now, but he thinks they're close to a breakthrough.

"You need a rest," he says, deflecting.

Sakura narrows her eyes at him, and walks briskly past him. She spares no glance at the corpse beside her. The man had been reasonably young, close to his forties. He was proof that somewhere, out there, Kaguya's influence still had not proved itself as perfect as she claimed it was.

Still. Shikamaru crouches down gently beside the corpse, breaking the circle as he does. He sets the man's head on his body, and covers it with a palmful of earth.

This man was proof that life was capable of enduring even in this world. His real, young life, and not the artificial ones of Sakura and Shikamaru. But he was untrained. Untested in battle against enemies that used better tactics than the brute force of a White Zetsu horde.

If Sakura and Shikamaru were going to kill the Rabbit Goddess forever, he needed to be smarter than that. And so did the people that raised him.

Sakura and Shikamaru had been searching for survivors for years. The bands of refugees seemed to evade the two of them as well as they evaded Kaguya.

"We don't have time for shame, Shikamaru," she says, the permanent white lines of her Byakugo making her seem all the more ghostly. "He was a traitor to all survivors."

Shikamaru scratches the back of his head, and with an absentminded thumb, traces the place where countless decapitation scars ought to circle his neck. He doesn't mind the lack of gnarled skin.

"I know."

Then she's beside him, step soft and quiet, the backs of her knuckles brushing against his, asking for permission. Shikamaru takes her hand.

"This means we're close," she says.

"I know."

Sakura presses her lips to the space just beneath his jaw, and from this close, Shikamaru can feel the force of the life she's just stolen from this man. He wonders if she can feel the way the cloud of his death hangs around Shikamaru's face, like a veil of fresh cigarette smoke. Life and death, the both of them.

[the-formerone]

shikasakuhanami 2019: day 1

yes, i work backwards, but i get the work done, don’t i?

for day 1′s prompt, the rusty end of a blade

flash in the nick of time on ao3!

Shikamaru is going to die and Sakura cannot watch it happen.

She knows him now, knows him better than she should, maybe. He's her comrade. He's her friend. She had felt his absence keenly when he left for Miyajima Forest, the dwelling place of the deer summons that contracted selectively even among the Nara. He had come back a sage, right in the nick of time to save the world. Save the village, rather.

The Naru-Sasu-Saku was a heavy demolition and distraction type of team. The flash and the bang, if you would. They had been assigned to keep Pein's different bodies separate from one another, and to kill as many of them as possible if they managed to corner one.

That was before Shikamaru led an army of deer bigger than grown shinobi from the bowels of Fire Country into the decimated village, coming up behind Pein and destroying any hope for Akatsuki's retreat.

Now, with Shikamaru pinned, with his beautiful healing-summoning-soothing hands pierced through with those strange, black chakra receivers; with his magnificent buck, bright green in color with one broken horn thrown onto his side, choking beneath the arm of one of Pein's burly bodies. Now, Sakura throws herself forward.

There was a reason the Haruno settled in Fire Country; it was always good to be invaded on a sunny day.

Sakura gathers as much yin chakra into her eyes as possible, summoning up chakra as she does, and when she squeezes her eyes tight, holds her hands and fingers in Bird.

When she sees the world again, she is moving as quick as the light from the sun does.

Sakura is well aware she will get chewed to heaven and hell and back again if she lives through the Haruno forbidden technique. Her mother will bring her back to life just to punt her into death again. But she's willing to take that chance. Or rather, she has to be.

Because she's already done it.

For the first half a second, her eyes begin to bleed, and then Sakura realizes that time hasn't accounted for her yet. She recovers herself with a quickness that only a kunoichi could, and as her organs shudder to follow her, she runs.

The speed of her attacks makes up for the lack of strength she can display during the jutsu, so when she goes to release Shikamaru's buck, she takes half of Pein's path with her. And when she goes to release Shikamaru, she tears the chakra receiver out of his hands and throws it, and it flies, far out of the stratosphere.

She tries, she tries to land a hit before she blinks, but her eyes can't take the strain, and neither can her body, and just before her fist can connect with Pein's wicked, still face, Sakura slumps.

She can see Shikamaru from where she is on the ground. She fell on her side, and he turns his face towards hers. Time accounts for Sakura again, and it all goes very slowly until it goes back to normal again.

"Sa - Sa - ,"

Her name sounds warbled and far away in his mouth, and the blood in her eyes is mixing with some kind of enzyme in her blood, designed by genetics and fate and the gods to protect her should this ever happen. But Sakura is well aware of what she's lost today. Of what she's done. Not blind, maybe. Her eyes were made for the strain. But her body. Her bones. Her very blood.

She might have just ended her shinobi career.

But that was the point, wasn't it? To be ready to give your life for your precious people. That was what Kakashi-sensei had taught her, and what Sakumo-sensei had taught Sakura's parents before them. Always use your most powerful techniques in the defense of precious people.

Sakura smiles, even as blood tacks her eyelashes together, even as Shikamaru reaches out, his hand glowing green, trying to help her even now. She reaches out, tries to feel for her fingers but she - she can't quite feel -

Shikamaru's hand on her cheek. And she knows it by the sandalwood smell of him, by the earthy power-chakra-smell still on him from his Forest. She sees him, standing over her, a pelt on his shoulders, and from his forehead, slowly  extend a small pair of bone-white antlers. Shikamaru's sclera go black as his pupils, and the hand on Sakura's cheek somehow gets softer.

'He's a sage,' someone in the back of her mind reminds her. 'You're a sage, and he's healing you.'

A laugh tries its way out of her chest, but she doesn't quite make it. Instead, she opens her mouth and croaks, "Can wait."

Shikamaru's expression breaks when she says it, but when she murmurs, "Kick ass," a kind of smile settles on his face that goes grim with determination the next time he looks up. He makes a sign with one hand and a swipe of his blood, and then Sakura is being lifted gently onto the back of a doe who bears her away to the infirmary.

The blood from Sakura's eyes stains the white doe's pelt, but she has enough control to turn her head over her shoulder, and look back at him as she is taken away. Shikamaru is standing tall, his back to her, the wind tousling in his loose hair.

'In defense of a precious person.'

She falls asleep knowing her sensei would be very proud of her for this.

[shikasaku-week]

ShikaSaku Week Hanami 2018

SHIKASAKU WEEK HANAMI

When:

March 23rd-March 29th

Where:

• you can post anywhere! Tumblr, AO3, FF.net, DA, Twitter, go wild! • please send us a link to your fanwork so we can add it to a masterpost for everyone to see! • tag it with #shikasakuhanami or @shikasaku-week to help us find it

How:

• the only requirement is for ShikaSaku to be the main pairing in your fanwork. It can be a fic, a fanart, a fanvid, a gifset, an edit, it’s up to you! • you can find the prompt list on the blog, or on this post

Please, no character bashing. We’re here to promote a ship, not ruin other people’s day.

PROMPT LIST:

DAY ONE Shadows/Lights

DAY TWO Blood/Sweat

DAY THREE Civilian POV/Team POV

DAY FOUR Secrets/Lies

DAY FIVE Then/Now

DAY SIX (also Sakura’s birthday) Safe bets/Risks

DAY SEVEN Free Day/Roleswap AU

Have fun and share it around! We may still be a smol rare pair, but trust me, we’re still damn proud of our little otp!