Week 66: Coming to Terms

Shinobu was lying in silence on a bed in Oracle Jerusalem's barracks, indistinguishable from any member of the crowds outside if not for being on the wrong side of the building's security. She gazed up at the ceiling, idly playing with her hair, and then brought up a VoWDP^* program on her internal computer and gave Coraline a call.

"Hey, Coraline? It's Shinobu. How's it going?" Shinobu spoke more calmly than normal, missing the cheer^† that was often obvious in her tone.

*Voice over World Data Protocol, because it wouldn't be the future if it was called the internet.
^†Which is always totally genuine and never at all affected, no sir.

Coraline paused, looking in bewildered confusion at her phone. Shinobu's voice* had issued from her phone immediately after she hit accept. Oh, of course, Shinobu is quite computer isn't she? The plague doctor giggled aloud at her accidental mental pun and put the phone to her ear. Coraline had spoken with an edge of exhaustion on the most recent mission, that was gone now, replaced with renewed cheer. "Darling hello, it's so good to hear from you. I'm... much improved now that I've caught up with our mutual friend the sandman. I trust you have seen him yourself since the mission? So, sweet heart, to what do I owe the pleasure?" The former plastic surgeon toyed with the idea of flirting but... the ninja seemed somewhat out of sorts. As she waited for a reply Coraline checked her GPS and took the next left, as advised.

*?

"Well," Shinobu replied, neglecting to mention that she'd barely slept at all since the mission. "I wanted to say thanks. For saving my life?" She paused for a moment. "I mean, I know we're all colleagues and helping one another is what we do and all... But thanks."

"Oh Shinobu, darling, you give me too much credit. You had already dealt with the danger on both occasions that I've medpacked you." Following a thoughtful pause the plague doctor added. "It means a lot though, that you would call me, just to say so. Thanks to you too, darling. Without you, on both of those missions, I'd have been in way greater peril too. I won't lie, it is nice to be complimented for my work. It's not just what I do, fixing people up, it feels good too. So, um, thanks for that as well sweet heart. Haha, oh wow that must have sounded strange." Coraline's voice sounded strained as if she was cringing after hearing herself say something so awkward.

"Hey, it didn't sound half as weird as some of the stuff Hugo says." A faint smile came over Shinobu's face as she thought about Hugo's silly gun-kissin' behaviour before this jailbreak business began. "I appreciate what you're saying, but... I'm not doing enough. I shouldn't be protecting you from danger, I should be eliminating it before it can be dangerous to anyone. It's my job. You shouldn't have to be fixing me up at all."

Coraline licked her lips as she tried to think of the best way to affirm both of their roles. "Darling, you are expecting too much of yourself. No one can walk through a facility, discreetly eliminating all resistance without altering the rest of security. Especially since the security we go up against are other agents. Besides which, the times I have medpacked you? They were both after someone else had tripped the alert. I'm at least partially to blame on the last mission. I should have done more to distract that engineer." The plague doctor paused for a moment, considering possibilites, before remembering what she was doing. Thankfully the UIG built lots of safety measures, so she only had to brake a little. "Oh, sorry darling, got a little lost in thought for a minute there. Really though, what could you do to improve in the time frame we have between missions? I'm only even close to effective in the field because of my augments, and hey sweetie, patching our people up is my job. You wouldn't want to render me redundant, right.... right?" Coraline teased, trying to lighten the ninja's spirits by appealing to her trolling nature. Though there was a quaver of worry in the ex VK agents voice.

"Of course I don't want to do that, Coraline. Of course. It's just..." Shinobu trailed off into a sigh. "You're right, yeah. I... Yeah. Speak to you later." With that, Shinobu ended the call and returned to staring up at the ceiling. What was the point, really?

The plague docotr pouted at her phone. So she was doing something wrong. It wasn't just that she had had to earn the ninja's attention, she was wrong and Shinobu clearly couldn't stand it. Coraline was begining to have serious misgivings about all four of them. As the former VK agent finished parking she crossed her arms over the wheel and pressed her head against them. Perhaps it was bettter if she didn't get close to anyone in Oracle..... somehow.