| [Dec. 18th, 2013|11:30 pm] |
There was no mocking in the amber-hazel eyes. Ryouma dropped his own gaze, before the sincerity could hurt.
"Never had brothers," he said. His wrist itched; he rubbed it discretely against the rough fabric of his jeans, which didn't do much to scratch it. "Do I get to call you aniki now, instead of lieutenant?"
Genma let the lobby door swing shut. "Only if one of us is actively dying. Which I don't intend to see happen anytime soon." He fell into an easy walking pace, almost a saunter, heading down the path that led to the Monument cliff and the village below. "Speaking of which… I didn't really get a chance to debrief with you. I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about the mission, now that we're home."
Relief loosened Ryouma's shoulders. He hadn't realized how tightly his muscles had knotted until he felt them ease, with even joking about family left in their wake and only mission-talk ahead. Analyzing mistakes and second-thoughts and should-have-dones was easy. He'd had plenty of practice with the Intel debrief already.
"I spent too much chakra too early," he said. "And again, with the queen. I put everyone in danger, draining myself that low and requiring transfusions from Namiashi-taichou to keep me going. Took soldier pills before I really needed them, too, which meant I didn't have the leeway to take more later. I could have jumped when the queen fell over, and tried to attack her from another angle, but I knew that armor-plating shell thing was thick and I still think going through the weak spot Kakashi'd created on her back was the fastest way." He tried to think of any other mistakes he'd made. The Intel debriefer had required an exhaustive list, but it was hard remembering them all without prompting, now.
Genma glanced back at him, brows raised over mild eyes. "You're being kind of hard on yourself, don't you think? Those are valid points, especially about the chakra and soldier pills, but I'm pretty sure you observed more on the mission than your own shortcomings."
"Well, yeah, but I thought—" Ryouma cut himself off. Why question the man who didn't seem to want him to flay himself for public instruction or amusement? He said instead, "Sure. D'you want other people's shortcomings? Or things we did awesomely?" Intel hadn't been nearly as interested in the second one.
They passed from the sunlit path into the thin shade of a grove of cherry trees, their blossoms past and their leaves darkening with the advancing spring. Ryouma buried his hands deeper in his pockets, shoulders again hunching against the chill. Genma tugged the zipper of his sweatshirt up. "Both," he said. "And anything else you can think of, really, even if it wasn't a mistake. Like, it wasn't a mistake that we didn't have topo maps of the mine interiors in the area, but they would have been really useful."
"Intel should've provided 'em along with the other maps, if they had 'em," Ryouma said. "If they thought it was bandits, and they knew there were mines in the area, it's a pretty safe bet the bandits might've holed up in 'em…" He brooded over this. "I guess we should've seen there were mines, though, when we looked at the maps the first time. And requisitioned any additional info from Intel. Maybe there wasn't any, but we should've made sure of it."
Genma nodded. "Exactly. It's one of those things that seems obvious in hindsight, but somehow we missed it on our way out. That's a demerit for me, since I was map-reader for the team." |
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