Right. Back there, in that hole in the ground, penned in on all sides by approaching enemies with no way to escape--

Rina laughed weakly and shifted closer to Genma, pressing her side against his when he allowed it. "We weren't supposed to see any action. There were three of us just to be safe, because I would be vulnerable--" Her nerve-charged images of Shouji and Yushiro skewered by kunai, peppered with shuriken, blown apart like Yushiro had been, flashed behind her eyes, clear as life. "Well. You know how that turned out."

A ninja shouldn't have a good imagination, Toshiro-sensei had told her several times, always with a weight behind it that she hadn't been able to decipher.

"We were just supposed to trap the bunker and leave. I guess they were going to leak the location, that some important intel was being stored there, to draw in the Cloud-nin? I don't know, it wasn't in my briefing..." She took a deep, shaky breath. "Anyway, something must have gone wrong, because they were suddenly on our backs. Yushiro managed to get out the warning, so I was able to hole up, but..."

Trailing off, Rina picked at the shredded knee of her uniform pants, not looking at Genma. "Shouji... That was hours ago." She had to ask. "He didn't... He told you where I was, and the safe route, right? But..."

Ribs blasted bare and bleeding. A head injury, skull cracked and pupils blown wide. Skin crackled black with burns. So many ways to be fatally injured and yet carry on for that last little bit longer.

"Shouji... did he make it?"