Day 49: Evening - Bus 3

[doneinthree]

Kirk had barely begun to dry when a nurse appeared to order them to the buses, but he left the warm shelter of the sheriff's office without complaint, and without even bothering to do up the buttons of his coat. The apprehension which had been edging around his thoughts all day was unignorable now, although probably only those who knew him could read it in the urgency of his movements. To the nurses he passed, he simply seemed like another patient in a rush to get out of the rain.

Last week's trip had apparently ended with everything exploding into mayhem at the end of the day, so fact that they were getting as far as the bus was a good sign — probably. Kirk for one would let himself relax once he was sure they weren't all about to be drowned. With this rain, there was little chance of gathering the crew again to discuss their findings, but he'd still rather get there soon enough to make sure they were all accounted for.

As luck would have it, Kirk's speed put him among the first dozen to board the buses. The nurse giving pat-downs before scolded him for not dressing properly, which he deflected with a grin and a cheerful suggestion of how else she could handle him. With how quickly she pushed him on the bus after that, it was too bad Kirk didn't actually have anything to smuggle back.

He chose a seat near the front, and settled in to look out the window for familiar faces. You had to hand it to Landel's staff — at the rate the prisoners were being rounded up, they'd be off in this hellish storm in no time.

[Roxas]

Comments

[toobothersome.livejournal.com]

Shikamaru wasn't happy about Sakura's decision, but he wouldn't argue with experience. After she heard about Kakashi she'd fled the room, probably cried and hit a bunch of things and been generally miserable (still was, most likely), but even after all of that, knowing what happened, she'd want to do the whole damn thing over again. Trying to talk sense into her didn't work, and although Sakura's relentless hopefulness was probably good for group morale, it was becoming a pain in the ass for him. There was just so much futility in this place, like running laps around nothing at all with the added bonus of bloodthirsty carnivores. Honestly, if he didn't know that the other Leaf-nin were putting themselves in danger, he'd sleep the whole night through.

But whatever. He had a job to do, and at least now he could do it without the hassle of censoring bulletin notes.

"Hey," Shikamaru said, dropping into the seat beside Sakura when he caught sight of her pink locks. "Great weather."

Hopefully, she knew more about the others than he did.

[see-my-back.livejournal.com]

It'd been difficult to even try reasoning with the nurses about what bus to get on. To her surprise, they'd started loading up patients right on schedule. Apparently a zombie invasion every week wasn't conducive to their mental health. Or something. She tried insisting that she wanted to sit with someone, but even that had only tried the nurse's patience. Luckily, Shikamaru must've seen which one she'd hopped on.

"Yeah, really," she huffed in return. It was hard to tell from the look on his face, but if the bulletin notes were any indication, Shikamaru wasn't having the best of days. If there were more ninja back at the institute tonight, things might get complicated, either way.

She glanced over, sizing him up for a moment. He seemed well enough. "I was going to tell you, I've already got plenty of stuff to treat people. The only thing I'd ask for on top of what I've got is maybe a sewing kit," she shrugged.

"No offense, but as much as I'd love to go running around on research and supply runs, I think I'd do a lot better doing my job and assisting as medic on one of the other teams." It made a whole lot more sense to her to be tagging along with the people going to the most dangerous places. They were the ones who needed a medic after all. But she just hadn't had a lot of involvement in the other nin's assignments, so who knew where they were going? Hanatarou might be on to something with helping out the other patients.

[toobothersome.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, yeah. I get that. You want to do your job." The boredom in Shikamaru's tone hid an edge of impatience, and his sigh was a little sharper than necessary. "But where's this team going to come from?" He leaned his head against the back of the bench seat, staring at the bland metal roof for several seconds before drawing a long breath.

"You're a medic, but you're also a strategist," he started. "So who's going to keep Naruto from getting killed tonight? What's Sai doing? Or Jiraiya? When's the last time you talked to Kakashi about his plans? Gai's here too now...what about him? And that Uchiha kid." Even listing all of the names was a pain in the ass. He opened his eyes and turned to look at her.

"That's eight people, but if you don't hear anything and no one shows up at your door, you'll just go out alone and get killed?" Sakura was the Hokage's apprentice, a hard worker with a quick and level mind, but even though she was Leaf-nin's only medic, she shrugged off the risk as if it wasn't her problem to deal with. That made it his problem to deal with. He pressed his hand to his head. "You need to be smarter than that."

The outside alliances that she and the other Leaf-nin held seemed to have been forgotten. For now, Shikamaru was so focused on the people from his village that everyone else became scenery.

[see-my-back.livejournal.com]

Was he seriously putting the blame on her?! What the hell?

"Kakashi's the one who told me to keep up these stupid errands, ok? He told me to butt out while he handled some things, which I assumed you were helping him with, being that you're supposed to be the smart guy and all," she hissed, unable to keep some bite from her tone. It was totally unfair for him to judge her like that! She'd done every single thing she'd been asked to do!

"You think I haven't been trying? It's not like I don't ever post on the bulletins, but I can't make people respond." Sure, maybe it sounded like an excuse, but it wasn't like she was actually going to go anywhere dangerous by herself. And alone was a hell of a lot better than babysitting Raphael. And hadn't she done just fine her first couple nights? Before she'd even had help from the others? If anything, she'd shown that she WAS perfectly capable of going on her own if she damn well pleased!

[toobothersome.livejournal.com]

The anger in Sakura's tone came as an immense relief, and some of Shikamaru's tension faded. Yes, he should have been helping Kakashi with this. He should have made sure that everyone was accounted for and kept track of what they were doing, even though he knew that escape was impossible. Especially because he knew that escape was impossible. If the others didn't think they were doing enough, they would do more, regardless of the danger, and odds were he wouldn't know about it. Even if they couldn't get out, they had to think that they could, or at least think that whoever was coming up with ideas thought that they could. It was basic morale.

He needed to talk to Kakashi. Soon. He'd seek out the jounin as soon as night fell and explain everything, but the sky was still dim with dusk and he needed to say something now.

"Okay, so enough with the errands. I'll figure something out when it comes to the sewing junk." Shikamaru rubbed his neck and looked down. This wasn't lying, exactly. It hardly counted as manipulation. Still, the situation was a pain in the ass, and the whole thing made him feel dizzy and sick. The bus smelled like rain and exhaust, stronger than before, but no one seemed to notice. "The research is important, though," he said. "We can't figure out how to reverse whatever brought us here unless we know how he did it, and even though it sounds boring, it..."

This wasn't going to work. The more he spoke, the worse he felt. No wonder they didn't use buses in Konoha. He swallowed hard.

"What do you think needs to be done?" he asked. If he knew what idiotically reckless thing she had in mind, he might be able to find a less dangerous alternative. At first, he'd been annoyed that some of their night work seemed to exist only to keep them busy, but now, he saw the necessity. Keeping people busy was the best way to keep them safe.

[see-my-back.livejournal.com]

Shikamaru finally seemed to get it, but he did make some good points too. While she really doubted whatever had brought them here would be in her area of expertise, they really needed to do some research into how someone might have done it. Some kind of crazy-powerful jutsu had been her first guess, but not everything here played by the same rules as back home.

"I'll see what I can dig up on it," she replied, raising an eyebrow at the sudden reaction Shikamaru seemed to be having. He was lazy, but he hadn't even finished his sentence. He might've been able to hide the other symptoms from anyone else, but she was a medic. She looked for and diagnosed things like this on a regular basis. She fully intended to keep her word and do the research, but she was also careful to watch Shikamaru a lot closer.

As for what needed to be done? "I have maps, I have medical supplies and enough weapons to get by. Most of the research I've done was inconclusive, but I have found some things, here and there. I would say tracking down the people running the place, but there's a lot of people who've been here longer than us and still haven't done it. The places there's the least amount of information about seem like they would be the best ones to check. That is, the basement, or the outlying regions of the institute."

She paused, flipping through her notebook. Unlike with Naruto, she could actually count on Shikamaru to remember the things she showed him. Waiting until the nurses were far enough away not to notice, she cracked open her journal and showed him the map she'd collected on her last visit to the town. It was vague, but gave information on the town, and the areas surrounding it. "Me and Sasuke-kun found this last time we were here. I think he knows more about the basement too. What do you think?"

[toobothersome.livejournal.com]

What did he think? He thought he wanted this bus ride over and done with. The drumming of rain on metal sounded like an angry hailstorm, despite the fact that it looked no heavier than it had when he'd sat down.

Shikamaru pushed his discomfort aside for the few seconds it took to memorize the map, then closed his eyes and leaned back once again. At the mention of outlying areas, he remembered his early conversation with Momo, and the map that he'd drawn based on that conversation. She'd described some areas as too treacherous to explore and when he drew a copy for Naruto he'd considered leaving those places off the map altogether, concerned that Naruto might take a warning as a challenge, but in the end he included them along with a heavily-inked cautionary note, depending on Sakura to be the voice of reason if Naruto wanted to stray.

Shortsighted.

"I think it's strange that people have known about these unexplored places for weeks, but still, no one's explored them," he said without opening his eyes. "I know a lot of people have made it into the basement, at least. If you want to pursue that, we should get in touch with Momo again." The Shinigami seemed to know what she was doing.

And then Sasuke. Always Sasuke. This was something he had to deal with carefully. Shikamaru was sure that the missing-nin wouldn't lift a finger to help Sakura unless he directly benefited, but Sakura would never believe it. "See if you can find out anything else from him," Shikamaru finally said. "But..." Again, a trailing off, but this one seemed more thoughtful than the last. She knew that he didn't trust Sasuke, so he didn't have to say it. Even suggesting that she talk to him was out of character, considering the sway Sasuke held over her, but there wasn't an alternative. Shikamaru doubted that he needed to know whatever Sasuke knew, but he needed to be aware of what Sasuke was telling Sakura. "You know how I feel about him," he said, "but you also know him better than I do." Again, it wasn't a lie, but the phrasing implied a trust in her opinion that he didn't actually hold. The pang of guilt was processed and dismissed. If this was what he had to do to keep everyone alive, he'd have to learn to deal with it.

Shikamaru concentrated on remaining very still, which tempered what he assumed must be some kind of motion sickness. Did motion sickness cause headaches? How much longer was this ride?

"What do you think about this radio junk?" he finally asked. Let her talk for a while, he thought, and pull yourself together.