Day 50: Cafeteria (Brunch)

[selfrescuer.livejournal.com]

Somehow, after their talk in the chapel, Elaine felt simultaneously more accepting of and more irritated by her future husband. On the one hand, seven years had clearly been good to him. He seemed more sincere and thoughtful than he had been before his disappearance, and he had a more mature (dare she say, handsome?) look to him. On the other hand, there were clearly some things that made even time throw up its hands in vain and say, "To hell with this!" Guybrush was still inexorably prone to disastrous accidents if the story about the Pox of LeChuck was anything to go by, and he was so obviously keeping something important from her that any passing dolt in the Institute would have been able to tell. In the end, that eternal underlying sweetness of his that won out, keeping her from punching him again, at least. That was only by a hairs width, though. Her snugglecakes was going to have to stay on his best behaviour if he knew what was good for him.

She left the Mighty Pirate™ alone for the time being when the announcement of the next shift went off. He would want some time to catch up with Morgan next, presumably. As much as the woman's attitude bothered her, she was a friend of Guybrush's, as she had claimed. Elaine could be strict, but she wasn't the kind of shrewish future wife/past fiancé who would keep her man from seeing his friends. Besides, she needed some more time to catch up on the goings-on of the Institute. Patients filled the building to the brim, now, it seemed; there would be a lot to investigate.

After a few quick trips back and forth to the bulletin and a few new leads to follow up on, the governor gave in to her nurse's persistent nagging and headed to the cafeteria for brunch. After the relatively light fare of the day before, Elaine took advantage of the Institute's admittedly scrumptious offerings and loaded up a full, balanced brunchfast of eggs, sausage links, waffles, and vegetable soup. As expected, the selection of drinks did not offer either root beer or grog. Grog she could live without, at least, she thought while making a face. Eugh. For now, she settled for a tall glass of water.

Elaine settled into a seat in the cafeteria and tucked into her meal. Her eyes didn't stay on her food, though, instead gazing around restlessly; she hadn't seen LeChuck so far this morning, and god forbid he wanted to invite himself to brunch with her if he chose now to show up. A certain horribly unpleasant dinner on Mêlée Island came to mind. She was prepared to either move at the first sign of the dread pirate or signal a random stranger to sit with her before he could.

[For Dean]

Comments

[see-my-back.livejournal.com]

For some reason, that seemed to irk Kiba. What was with the sighs and the attitude?! Brat.

But way ahead? So he was really far in their future? He didn't look that much older than the last time she'd seen him, so it couldn't have been a matter of years or anything like that. But with how tense the situation had been between other villages and with Sasuke and Akatsuki before she left, maybe a lot had happened between her time and his. She already knew things were dangerous enough because of what Kakashi had told them, but Kiba was still alive, (at least she assumed so) and well, not freaking out or anything, so it couldn't be that bad!

"I already heard about what happened to Kakashi-sensei," she admitted, looking down at her tray, "but what about the rest of Konoha? Is everyone alright?" It was a difficult question to ask, knowing full well that she might not like the answer. Knowing that it might mean hearing about even more deaths and destruction, but it was better to know, she told herself, so she could be prepared, so maybe she could change things.

[livesbyinstinct.livejournal.com]

"The rest?" he said, narrowing his eyes as he watched Sakura look down at her tray. He wasn't sure how to interpret that. He grunted once, tone evening out some. "Mostly. Tsunade's unconscious and Konoha's leveled after what that Pain-bastard did. His resurrection jutsu (or whatever kind of jutsu it was--hell if I know) didn't fix that part of Konoha. Good news is that he dead. Snuffed himself out, and good riddance."

He wasn't sorry that he was gone either, even if Pain had apparently tried to make up for what he he had done to Konoha. The guy had just about killed Hinata, the son of a bitch. There was no forgiving him for that. He would've liked to have beat the crap out of the guy himself, had he been able to.

"You also remember Danzo, right? That creepy bastard that Sai reports to?" And that was another reason why he didn't trust Sai. He seemed to follow the orders of a certified nutcase. "He's hokage now. Still is, as far as I know."

[see-my-back.livejournal.com]

Leave it to Kiba to just blurt everything out. The feeling, she realized, must've been oddly similar to what'd happened when she'd spilled about Jiraiya to Shikamaru. She had to take it in pieces, just to make sure she understood. Tsunade was unconscious? Pain was the guy from Akatsuki, but...

"Would you slow down a little?!" she shook her head. "So Akatsuki attacked Konoha? But why the hell would he use a resurrection jutsu?" And more importantly, on who? She'd seen what that sort of jutsu looked like, what it could do, but it still didn't explain why Pain would've used it on anyone in Konoha. Having one of the most powerful enemies they'd ever faced just off himself like that seemed way too convenient.

But when she heard that Danzo- DANZO?! was the new hokage, she couldn't hold her temper in check any longer. Her fists slammed down on either side of her tray, rattling the dishes and almost overturning her plastic cup of water.

"WHAT!?"