Mission: Burying the Past in Zompania

[lucetimods]

Who: Anyone who volunteered
What: A very special mission that will bring you honor. Or maybe just traumatic memories. Whatever.
When: July 20th - July 24th
Where: Zompania, or what's left of it
Summary: Mission detailed here. There are graves to dig and buildings to raze, and plenty more for the volunteers to stay busy with.
Rating: PG-13 for probable mentions of gore and other sad things

Direct further questions here!

Comments

[endgames]

[Shikamaru had just finished sealing another body into the scroll. Once the cloud of smoke dissipates (fairly fast), standing over him like she is Sheena may notice the kanji for "body" repeated several times on the parchment.]

It's a storage scroll. [He looks back down at the paper.] I'm sealing the bodies into it so they're easier to carry. I can transport more than a cart would with it, and it's less of a pain that way.

[corrinesbell]

[Oh really. The scroll gets a better appraisal now - she can read it without the benefit of weird translation occurrences - and the 'body body body' is a little creepy but effective.]

Can you teach that to people?

[endgames]

Sorta. You'd have to know how to mold chakra first. That's something I can also teach, but it would take time.

[Sealing is one of the easier jutsus, however, once you have that down. For these purposes anyways.]

[corrinesbell]

Oh. I dunno if I can do that; it's just that this kinda moving stuff around looks a lot less...messy. And way less likely to upset anybody.

[endgames]

Heh. [He rolls up the scroll, making to sling it across his back and rise in the same motion.] Less smelly too. Are you also collecting bodies?

[corrinesbell]

I'm doing whatever there is to do. So, yeah, it's stuff like that right now. [Sheena pulls a face.] Can't say I like it very much. It was a really awful fight and some stuff happened that I'm not sure I totally understand yet.

[endgames]

Mm. I'm not sure I want to either, though the extra intelligence would make things simpler. I should've brought my camera.

[corrinesbell]

You wanna have pictures of this whole nightmare?

[He likely wants them for other reasons, but she can't guess at them. What good do pictures do?]

[endgames]

I want to learn all we can from it. After we're done here, we won't be able to study any of this again.

[corrinesbell]

I dunno about you, but I hope we don't get the chance to see any of this stuff again. We're running out of places to see it in, if you follow me.

[endgames]

[He snorts, casting his eyes away from her and out across the city. Ruins and rubble. He takes it in flatly, arms draped loosely over his knees.]

That kind of optimism is naive. Luceti will be a target, eventually, but it probably won't be the next one. The world is a bigger place than a handful of bubbles.

[Vaskoth. Zompania. Pagoda and Quell, very nearly. They hear more about the enclosures than they do the places and people that exist outside of them. Shikamaru is willing to bet they haven't all gone without their scars too.]

I'm not going to look away if I'm there when that happens. If there's anything useful that can be learned, I want to absorb it all. Understanding your opponent is the best way to guard against his next move.

[So that when they do come again for Luceti, they'll be ready.]

[corrinesbell]

Hey, if you're gonna go around trying to knock the hope out of people, I guess that's up to you. But without that, some of us aren't sure if we've got another purpose in this place.

[Mouth set in a line, Sheena looks directly at Shikamaru's face.]

I don't care if you wanna call it optimistic or naive or any other thing that makes it sound, I dunno, weaker or less important than thinking we could all die like these people any day. It's worse for a whole village to lose its belief that things can get better if they keep getting better. And hoping I'm not gonna have to watch this happen to my friends before I'm gone isn't optimism. It's just hoping.

[endgames]

[He shrugs, roping the scroll onto his back.] You wanted an answer. I'm not spouting this off to everybody.

[He knows what the response would be. :T]