The Preserve, Late Monday Night

[intraspective]

The preserve, really, ought to have been fully dark considering how late it was, but Ino had brought a few portable lanterns and set them up around the perimeter of the clearing. She wore short sleeves despite the cold, and had her cards on her. Getting the kunai from the locker would’ve been too much hassle with everything else.

In her hands was a scroll and she was idly tossing it from one hand to the other as she waited for Reno. Because that was totally the way you treated quality literature. Of course.

The knapsack she had slung over one low hanging branch contained two other scrolls and she left them where they were for now.

[For the partner-in-crime, please!]

Comments

[raspberryturk]

"Not most of us. None of us who are still alive, anyhow," Reno agreed, shrugging. "You gotta kinda dig to figure out what you're still doin' it for, sometimes. For me, it was easy enough. But for some of the others, I think it took a little more doin', zoto."

[intraspective]

"Do you regret doing what you do?" Ino wondered, staring up at the sky.

[raspberryturk]

And, at that question, Reno offered a bit of a tired smile.

"If I ever let myself regret it, Ino, I wouldn't be able to look at myself in the mirror. Or sleep at night. Or breathe without feelin' bad about it."

[intraspective]

Enough questions then," she said. "So you don't gotta think 'bout any of it."

[raspberryturk]

"I appreciate it, yo." A pause. "Thanks again. I mean, for all the work you been doin' with these scrolls. They're gonna mean a lot, I think, to the people back on Gaia. We just gotta make it work. Make 'em more portable, or user-friendly, or somethin'."

Something.

[intraspective]

"They're not used for things like this back home," she said. "Just weapons and in the middle of battle. Tenten can whip these things out and aim the weapons in them while she's releasing them so that they'll hit the enemy. I can't do that, and I'm not sure she'd have ideas 'bout user friendly--to her, they are, you know?"