CHAPTER TWO: THE ART OF DOING NOTHING

PRT Headquarters

Shikamaru had perfected the art of looking busy.

It wasn’t hard. A slightly furrowed brow here, the occasional tap of a pen against his temple there, and—most importantly—never making eye contact with anyone who might assign him more work. He’d spent the last three days coasting through threat assessments with minimal effort, skimming files just enough to fake competence.

“This world might not have chakra, but bureaucracy is universal.”

Unfortunately, Shikamaru had barely stepped off the elevator when the whispers hit him.

”—Lung’s in custody—”

”—almost died in transport—”

”—Armsmaster’s under investigation—”

He blinked. “Well. That escalated.”

Reynolds, for once, looked awake, tapping furiously at his terminal. “Nara. You’re on damage control. Cross-reference all known parahuman toxins with whatever the hell nearly killed Lung.”

Shikamaru sighed. “So much for taking it easy.”

. . . . .

Break Room

The coffee was terrible.

Shikamaru stared into the murky depths of his cup, debating whether it was worth the caffeine, when a shadow fell over his table.

“You’re Nara, right? Threat Assessment?”

He looked up. A tired-looking PRT officer—Jenkins, according to his badge—leaned against the counter.

“Yeah.”

Jenkins lowered his voice. “You’re good at patterns. You notice anything weird about Lung’s injuries?”

Shikamaru arched a brow. “Weird how?”

“Like… bug bites. A lot of them.”

Shikamaru’s fingers tapped against his cup. Bug bites? That didn’t fit Armsmaster’s style. The man was a stern and uncompromising perfectionist—meticulous technology, efficiency-obsessed, clean takedowns. If Lung had been swarmed by something as crude and mundane as insects, then…

“Ah.”

He exhaled, leaning back. “That’s not the kind of thing a hero like Armsmaster would let happen on purpose.”

Jenkins nodded grimly. “That’s what I’m thinking.”

“So either he lost control of the situation… or someone else got to Lung first.”

. . . . .

Armsmaster’s investigation was swift and brutal.

By noon, he had been stripped of command. By three, his halberd was in pieces on an evidence table. By five, the whispers had spread. He cheated, he lied, he almost got Lung killed.

Shikamaru watched it all from the sidelines, filing reports he knew no one would read.

“A man that prided himself in preparing for things well ahead of time wouldn’t risk his reputation on a gamble.”

Unless he had no choice.

Unless someone else had forced his hand.

Shikamaru frowned, drumming his fingers against his desk. The bug angle wouldn’t leave him alone. If another cape had been there, they had to be new—his briefings didn’t mention any insect-based parahumans active in the city.

He hesitated before pulling up the classified reports system. Probably not worth the trouble… but now he was curious.

. . . . .

PRT Records Room

The file was buried under layers of clearance, but Shikamaru had spent years navigating worse bureaucracy than this.

Incident Report #4471-ENE

Subject: Unidentified Cape (Tentative Designation: ‘Skitter’)

The details were sparse—bug control, possible minor, last seen near the Docks. No official PRT classification yet.

“So. The real victor.”

Armsmaster had tried to clean up someone else’s work. And it backfired.

Shikamaru closed the file, exhaling slowly. This city’s more complicated than I thought.

. . . . .

PRT Rooftop

The city sprawled beneath him, a mess of flickering lights and simmering violence. Somewhere out there, a girl with too much power and no sense of self-preservation was making plans.

Somewhere else, a disgraced hero was grinding his teeth in the dark.

Shikamaru lit a cigarette—a habit he’d picked up in this life as well—and watched the smoke curl into the night.

“Troublesome.”