frost_jewel | 20. [mostly action]

20. [mostly action]

[Mia has been through a lot recently. The invasion wasn't so terrible, but its aftermath and the information surrounding it dealt a blow she still hasn't been able to face properly. Then, some of her dearest people went on a mission that continues to tear them apart inside - and may do a similar thing to all of them in due time, depending on what happens as a result. Then she became, briefly, herself but a few years younger, which might sound like a reprieve but was really just a way of delaying the inevitable backlash. Mia knows better than to think that that might be the 'punishment' coming to them after aiding in the implementation of a shift explosive.

In all that time, the way she interacts with people shifted, too. She is as friendly and welcoming as ever, but in some places more...distracted-seeming, perhaps, or carrying an air of professional civility instead of closeness. If anything, her tenure as pre-adventure Mia only reinforced her ability to stand at that distance.

Things haven't much calmed down, but she can't think of a time better than the present to take care of some things she's put off since the invasion happened. Shuffling them all around her work schedule means it happens at odd hours, but that's just how things have to be. She seeks out specific friends of hers, and stops by the plaza clinic to see who might be around. It isn't her usual routine, but she also goes to the cafe - though hardly a coffee drinker - for a change of pace. The gallery too.

Sometime in the afternoon, she finds a quiet corner to attempt to send a filtered message to Luceti's newest in-world resident, without knowing exactly how:]

Could we speak about a few things in person?

[It might work, it might not.

No matter how that turns out, as night falls she'll skip training, opting to visit the beach instead. To walk along the water with her bare feet in the sand and...hope that helps, somehow.]

[[ooc: Building walls with lego-bricks made of words, around here. Go nuts! Just not totally nuts.]]

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[Than usual. HA.]

Anything I can do to make it easier? I won't be such a jerk of a patient this time, promise.

[That's an offer for more beyond that too, but he leaves it vague so as to not overstep any lines.]

Asking you to tell me that all the terrible things I've heard in the past few weeks are lies...that's too far from possible, right?

[Very quickly does he turn serious; composed.]

Mm... You mean the bomb?

Yes, among other things. [Almost always composed and often serious, Mia's doing the reverse; observant as Shikamaru is, he's sure to see how tight her fists are at her sides.]

[He doesn't even have to look down to tell; the subtle tension of the veins in her arms is what he sees first.]

I could hear you out on the first... It might not be the best for it, as I decided it doesn't bother me, but I understand where you guys are coming from.

There isn't much to hear. I wasn't there and I can't make many assumptions about their decision. [She's not looking at him.] They all seemed quite ready to argue about whatever the rest of us felt.

It's the kinda thing that raises tensions. They came back on edge and got the response they expected, so they took their frustrations out on the crowd.

[If he really wanted to psychoanalyze it, he'd say half of them were arguing with themselves.]

Some of it, I just...I can't understand.

[Shikamaru is probably not the person to solicit this particular opinion from, but he's there and he's listening.]

May I ask you something? What do you think is your most important responsibility?

...Mine personally?

[Clarifying.]

Yes. Yours, the thing you would...would say your life is about. I'm sorry, it's a very strange question, and a leading one at that.

[It is strange, as she says. It's also not very important; he can recognize the significance is what the question means to her.

But once she's asked it, he can't help but think it over seriously. There are things he's promised, and there is his duty. His whole life, there were responsibilities that were thrust on him, and then ones he himself had to rise to.

It's hard to say which is most important to him.]

The thing about shinobi... Is that our lives aren't just our own. I'm a part of a whole, and so what matters to me is what I can contribute to that whole. In my case, it's that I'm a strategist. It's my duty to think of possibilities that others can't, and make the best decision for everyone with the information I have.

I want to use that skill to help those closest to me; to guide them, and do everything in my power to stay by their side.

[Mia's smile is dry, almost rueful. She knew she wouldn't get the answer she seeks, not from him, not with the way he thinks. This one is satisfying to hear, too.]

Well, you do a good job of it.

[He bows his head. It's minute, but a more genuine expression of thanks than he could put into words.]

Looking at you, I wonder if my guess for your answer would be the correct one.

Oh, you have a guess? [It isn't hard to guess at his guess, either.] What is it?

It's hard to put into words. [He tilts his head.] When push comes to shove, you're not a medic, or a doctor. You can do the same things as them, but your character lends to something broader than that... A healer, if I had to pick one word for it.

Well, I am a healer. [Her hands relax, finding no purchase on anything solid nearby and holding each other instead.] I've spent my life learning how to be one. But-

[It isn't a job, is it? Not the way those other words are. It's a responsibility, yes, one wholly different from both job and duty.]

When you...when you say it, that way, it doesn't sound- lesser. Separate and unrefined. [His analysis is so disarming it pushes aside her anger for the moment.]

My greatest responsibility is to the well-being of the people around me. All of them.

[He nods. It's what he thought. He remembers her from the first time they met, on that mission to the Third Floor; how she acted to heal everyone, no matter the risk to herself.]

It's not lesser. It's admirable, in a world where people are convinced they can't afford to think that way.

[He's one of those people, but he still respects it.]

[Part of that responsibility is making sure she doesn't put herself in harm's way if it isn't necessary. A comparatively small part.]

I am not convinced. Healers, doctors, what people call us doesn't really matter. We're supposed to help people, whenever we can. To choose not to bring destruction and pain to others.

[Can he hear it? No matter what side they're on. There is a line between defending herself or others and making an attack.]

There's several arguments I can make to that. [Blithely:] 'Not everyone can be helped; not everyone wants to be helped' and so on...

[Trailing off, he circles back to the point.] But I think that way because I'm a tactician, not a healer. That option has to be plausible besides worthwhile for me to pursue it. Doesn't mean I don't wanna, just that I need to see a way.

So if helping people like that is your ambition, I think you should keep doing what you're doing, and push people like me for it. [And Law, and everyone who disagreed with her on that locked post.] If you want to make it happen, you need to show everyone how it can be done.

I know not everyone can be or wants to be. That doesn't mean we choose to hurt them instead. And maybe...maybe sometimes, it can't be done. Sometimes the only choice that can bring hope to the future is one of strife in the present.

[Heaven knows she and her friends dealt with that choice often enough in a very short time.]

There are people I shouldn't need to push. Who have the same duties that I do, and make the same promises. I don't know how true that really is, now.

You mean Law.

[A question that isn't a question.]

[She looks him in the eye, silent.]

[Shikamaru sighs. And considers. Staring off into the space over her shoulder, he continues.]

There's something you're failing to consider, when you say he has the same duty as you do. [He doesn't miss that she's may be talking about several people, not just Law, but he can't speak for those.

In truth, maybe he can't speak for Law either.]

He's a doctor, not a healer. Even then, to him that is not his most important role. To think so is a mistake.

[The truth ringing in his words doesn't make them any easier to understand. How could he - or anyone - accept the role of doctor or healer without the knowledge that it was the most important one when they did so? It didn't limit a person to only that, of course, all people had passions and interests and other things they were good at and, at times, other duties of necessity.

But.]

Then I have been mistaken.

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