endgames | 012 -- [Voice || Action]

Show of hands if someone tried to prank you yesterday.

[Annoyed as he sounds, he's mostly gotten over it. Simply put, Shikamaru is just too lazy to hold a grudge when it comes to most things. He's still curious, however.

...but no longer orange, thankfully.]

------

[Later on, just before evening, Shikamaru can be found on his way back from the Item's Shop to CH 1, a certain book in tow. And for a book that stands at half his height and is nearly two feet thick when closed, we do mean tow. He'll be taking frequent breaks along his way back, dropping the book with a loud thud before sitting beside it on every bench he comes across.]

Damn thing weighs more than Temari's fan...

[Yeah, yeah, he's pretty weak for a ninja, he knows, but hey. The book does weigh about a hundred pounds or more. 8|

A passerby might catch him during one of those breaks, looking over it's contents in curiosity while the light is still good outside. But from there it's back to lugging it home.

The Nara Clan's medicine manual... the old man would kick my ass if I just left it lying around.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[It's his own fault he's carrying the stupid book alone in the first place.

It means you're acting like a short-sighted jerk.

Except she knows he's not one, because he didn't hesitate to use her in battle. So why was this any different?]

I know you're not the same, and and that's why it doesn't make any sense. In Northern Water Tribe, women weren't allowed to learn how to fight because of their culture. They can't learn waterbending and they had to have arranged marriages - just because they were girls. But you don't have any problem fighting alongside me - I don't see how helping you carry something is any different.

Edited 2011-04-10 05:26 (UTC)

[...you do realize that a lot of this backstory makes absolutely no sense without context, yes?]

Combat doesn't discriminate against sexes. If you can fight and you want to, than you should. Sometimes it's necessary - this isn't.

[You're the one who wouldn't put down the book for the full story - and no she does not. It's all perfectly clear inside her head.

And yes, ugh, she knows that combat doesn't discriminate. But heavy books don't discriminate either!]

So what you're saying is that it doesn't matter if women are as strong as men or as capable - in any situation where it's not life or death a man can't accept help from a woman and a woman should be willing to accept help from a man?

[...this is starting to sound less offensive and more painfully dumb in the 'If this wasn't so unfair the groceries I could make this guy carry for me' way.]

Not so much can't as 'shouldn't.

[What the woman does he has no bearing on - all that's important to him is that the man offer.]

...and 'shouldn't' because?

[He should recognize that a lot of the venom has gone out of her tone, but that it's a fragile moment which can tilt either way.

Fortunately, he's started to remind her of someone else. Someone... blond. With a curly eyebrow. She's had this sort of conversation before, and just... sigh.]

[He shrugs his shoulders as much as he can.]

Just shouldn't. [It's how the laws of his universe work.]

[Why are the men of these other worlds so weird?

And she facepalms, slides the hand down her face and mutters while her hand is covering her mouth:]

At least you'll hit girls.

[So she doesn't have to worry so much about his safety.]

All right, fine. I'll remember this. And the next time I have to move something heavy, I know who to call.

[.....dammit.]

How troublesome. [But he nods; turns around again.] Later.

Later.

[It still feels wrong to walk away and leave him carrying that, but...

Men are weird. So what else is new?]

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