Day 42: Fields
The nurse pointed him to the bulletin as soon as he left the bus, but after a few seconds of consideration, Shikamaru decided that he didn't feel like leaving a note asking the other Leaf-nin to check in. One of them should do it eventually; he'd written it in the notes he'd given Naruto and, if he remembered right, underlined it a couple times. He'd check again later, or not. Probably not. It wasn't his job. Kakashi or Jiraya could deal with it.
Shikamaru wasn't sure what his job was, actually. He'd tried to pull the others back together by giving them something to focus on that wasn't a bunch of miserable deaths, but the plan for his own group had been terrible and, as seemed to be a running theme in his life, they'd had to rely on luck. He had no idea what happened to the other team. Worse, on top of basing everyone's safety on a fundamentally flawed strategy, he'd given it as an order rather than a suggestion, when he had no authority to be issuing commands. It was a hell of a lot of work to be doing without being forced into it, Shikamaru realized with an irritated sigh, but that too made the list of stuff to deal with later. He knew that he should take this as an opportunity to learn from his mistakes, but there wasn't margin for error here and, despite his efforts, he obviously hadn't learned from the last one. Maybe the best thing to learn was to keep the hell out of people's way.
Which he ought to be more than happy to do.
The town wasn't large, but it still took him a few minutes' walk to find a park, and when he saw that it wasn't empty he walked until he found another. Also occupied. It seemed impossible to get a moment's peace in this place--either people were more extroverted here, or he'd developed an aura of please-talk-to-me when he wasn't paying attention. He hoped it wasn't the latter. Figuring there'd be some place along the edge of town where he could lie around without being bothered, Shikamaru continued on until he met an empty field. Uncut grass suggested that it'd only be of interest other people who didn't feel like being found, but the nurse wouldn't let him out of her sight, and with a heavy groan, he gave up when she yelled for him to stop. Geographically speaking, this was probably the furthest he could get from the institute. It didn't change the fact that he was trapped here, but it was still a pleasant thought.
[why more work, Kakashi?]
Shikamaru wasn't sure what his job was, actually. He'd tried to pull the others back together by giving them something to focus on that wasn't a bunch of miserable deaths, but the plan for his own group had been terrible and, as seemed to be a running theme in his life, they'd had to rely on luck. He had no idea what happened to the other team. Worse, on top of basing everyone's safety on a fundamentally flawed strategy, he'd given it as an order rather than a suggestion, when he had no authority to be issuing commands. It was a hell of a lot of work to be doing without being forced into it, Shikamaru realized with an irritated sigh, but that too made the list of stuff to deal with later. He knew that he should take this as an opportunity to learn from his mistakes, but there wasn't margin for error here and, despite his efforts, he obviously hadn't learned from the last one. Maybe the best thing to learn was to keep the hell out of people's way.
Which he ought to be more than happy to do.
The town wasn't large, but it still took him a few minutes' walk to find a park, and when he saw that it wasn't empty he walked until he found another. Also occupied. It seemed impossible to get a moment's peace in this place--either people were more extroverted here, or he'd developed an aura of please-talk-to-me when he wasn't paying attention. He hoped it wasn't the latter. Figuring there'd be some place along the edge of town where he could lie around without being bothered, Shikamaru continued on until he met an empty field. Uncut grass suggested that it'd only be of interest other people who didn't feel like being found, but the nurse wouldn't let him out of her sight, and with a heavy groan, he gave up when she yelled for him to stop. Geographically speaking, this was probably the furthest he could get from the institute. It didn't change the fact that he was trapped here, but it was still a pleasant thought.
[why more work, Kakashi?]