Day 33: Recreational Field (4th shift)

[yin_yang_fox]

By the time fourth shift came, Renamon was mentally tired. Even though she was able to somewhat sort her thoughts last shift, since Kaneyoshi had never shown, she was still a more somber fox than she usually was. As much as she didn't want to believe it, she was starting to think that she was looking for connections where there weren't any

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[hajike_tobiume]

[from here]

Feeling accomplished, Momo made her way out into the sun and fresh air of the rec field. Her nurse made it very clear to the shinigami that she was not to partake in any of the games because of her extensive injuries, but Momo hadn't been planning on it.

Sitting down carefully underneath a tree, her eye out for Reinforce and perhaps Hokuto, the shinigami pulled her journal and pencil out. Chewing on the end of the writing utensil, she frowned and sighed a little seeing the blood stain on the corner of her journal - her own blood. Oh well, what was done, was done.

The shinigami took the drawing she'd done of Signum with an angel-like abstract rendition of what she'd compiled of how Hayate would look like, she noted the upper corner and a bit more of the piece showed the brown color of dried blood. She sighed and tried to find the cleanest page in her journal, noting that all the maps she'd made were ruined, the dried blood obscuring too much of the map.

Setting the stained drawing of the knight down on the grass next to her, Momo put pencil to paper and started redrawing it.

[akarusa]

Once outside, Hokuto tilted her face up to the sun and closed her eyes, enjoying even the slight warmth. She wasn't a country girl by any means, but it was good to have a little fresh air once in a while, and when she was outside she could at least try to pretend that she was free to come and go.

She thought she might see if she could kick a ball around with Falis, but the thought slipped her mind when she saw Momo, and then her breath caught in her throat when she got a good look at the shinigami. The fight had been sounding bad, but...

Hokuto took a moment to just get herself under control; she couldn't cry every time someone she knew got hurt. But... she'd only been a few feet away when Momo got hurt, and hadn't heard a thing to make her think she needed to run in--she couldn't deny she'd been distracted, but she'd never stopped listening. There had been little or nothing she could do against Signum, and it would have felt awful to go up against her in battle, but feelings didn't listen to logic. And more than anything else, she hated feeling helpless.

When she was calm--at worst, her eyes were a little bright--she came over and dropped down next to her friend on the grass, giving her a quick smile. "Good afternoon. How are you?"

[hajike_tobiume]

Momo looked up from her new drawing when Hokuto sat down and gave her a warm smile. "Hello, Hokuto-chan. I've been better," she said with a little raise of her cast-enclosed wrist. "But I've also been much worse."

There was no need in the shinigami's mind to draw any attention to the nasty gash across her lower torso. It was best to let Hokuto think the broken wrist was the worst of it. "Did you have any trouble last night? I know some people got past you and Rosenburg-san, but don't worry about that - some were bound to."

[akarusa]

I stopped one group... There was so no way Hokuto was telling that story, though! "Not too much. It looks like I wasn't listening as well as I thought I was, though." She had very little reason to feel guilty, but unfortunately that didn't change anything.

"So what's the plan tonight?" Even if Momo wasn't going, she probably knew, and finding things out in advance was usually preferable.

[hajike_tobiume]

"Do not feel like you didn't do enough. I'm sure you prevented someone from getting needlessly hurt and that makes your mission a success," Momo replied. She didn't want Hokuto to think she didn't do enough. "And don't worry about me. My overall mission as a shinigami last night was a success, though I... failed in other ways."

As for the upcoming night... Well, that was a bit of sensitive topic. Momo gave the girl a small smile and then shook her head. "I'm sorry, Hokuto-chan, but I don't know what your mission is nor what your team will be; Hitsugaya did not tell me when I spoke with him earlier about tonight. You'll have to wait until he posts the assignments, I'm afraid."

[akarusa]

That was unusual... usually when Hokuto didn't find out in advance it was because she hadn't asked. "What's going on?" Something about this felt a little odd. Not bad, or exactly like Momo was hiding something, but...

She glanced at her friend's drawings and tried not to wince; when had those pages gotten soaked with so much blood? I hope it wasn't last night... She really hoped she'd be on Signum's team, at least. I want to check on her, too.

[hajike_tobiume]

If Hokuto had the proper knowledge or even touched the pages, she'd be able to tell the blood was no more than a day old, but the shinigami was hoping she didn't. Mostly because then she'd feel compelled to let the girl know exactly how injured she really was as well as how much she'd actually injured Signum. Maybe she wouldn't notice, Momo thought as she moved the finished, stained drawing of Signum a bit closer to herself.

"I am on special assignment tonight," Momo supplied. "You do not meet the requirements for this particular mission given the most prevalent danger involved in it, so you will be assigned to another team." She gave the girl an apologetic smile. "I'm sorry."

[akarusa]

I miss the days when being a black belt meant something! Hokuto was painfully aware that classes and tournaments could only teach so much, especially since she didn't have many weapon specialties, but she would have expected herself to be better at real combat than this. "So, you mean you need people with experience different than mine?"

It was for her own safety and she knew it, but she wanted to help out more than she was, and she was getting frustrated.

[hajike_tobiume]

At the questioned posed to her, Momo's cheeks flushed and she immediately looked down, busying herself with the drawing.

"Umm... yeah," Momo replied, her thoughts dragging her back to Hitsugaya and his... their... issue with the... her... experience.

[akarusa]

Hokuto blinked; okay, that response was unexpected. "What'd I say?" All she'd asked was a question about kinds of experience...

It was an effort not to giggle when she thought of something else that phrase could refer to, but that couldn't be it, right?

[hajike_tobiume]

"Oh... no... nothing," Momo replied, steadfastly looking at the papers before her, continuing to draw the knight's form once again instead of looking at Hokuto. The blush did not leave the shinigami's cheeks.

"It's just you're.... never mind. You'll find out your assignment soon enough. There's no need to go guessing about mine and Signum's." As soon as it was out of her mouth, she realized she'd made a mistake in letting the girl know the knight was on the special assignment. Now she had something to compare to.

Please draw the combat experience parallel...

[akarusa]

"C'mon!" Hokuto leaned forward, looking into Momo's eyes as if she could read the answer there--sometimes she could with Subaru. "What's disqualifying me from this mission?"

This was unlikely to be anything personal, so she didn't see how asking could be a problem. Besides, they were her friends, and she didn't like being left out of things without a reason.

[hajike_tobiume]

Damnit. Momo looked up when the light was obscured, seeing Hokuto staring at her. The shinigami squeaked a little and then cleared her throat in an attempt to cover it up. Taking her left hand, regardless of the cast, she gently pushed Hokuto back so she wasn't blocking her light anymore.

"Ummm..." The heat on her face just wouldn't go away and Hokuto wasn't going to let it go. "You're... lack of sexual experience," the shinigami said quickly and quietly before immediately burying herself in the drawing as she started turning the light sketch lines into a beautiful flowing tail of hair.

[akarusa]

"What?!" Hokuto nearly fell over. "I--what?" This did NOT compute. She'd heard of the virgin-eating birds (and nearly been attacked by them once already), but she was still too taken aback to really think at the moment.

She didn't move forward again, but she was at a complete loss for words and just staring at Momo blankly. She's--that doesn't--no way.

[hajike_tobiume]

The heat on the shinigami's face intensified. She didn't say anything in response to the exclamation sent her way, but continued to apply pencil to paper to give the knight's hair the detail it deserved. After the silence, and uncomfortable feeling accompanied by her attempt to will her face to return to a normal color, continued unabated, Momo looked up at Hokuto.

"You heard me," Momo said quietly and much more calm than she felt.

[akarusa]

Hokuto slowly sat back as her brain finally kicked into gear. "...gotcha," she managed.

She realized suddenly What, so you're saying you have some? at the same time part of her said, Wait a few days and I'll be qualified! Oh gods... she turned bright red and looked away. For once even she didn't know how what to do.