Mystery from Another World--MHA

Part 167: The Group gets Shipped

The groups finally rejoined each other just about when it was getting dark. It had been a really long day.

But Shine and Wally had both recharged and should be able to use their abilities at least moderately.

They were waiting for Intelli to give them the go ahead, so they had a few minutes while he was finishing up.

Shine thought Mirko looked strung out when they arrived, but then the woman pulled her aside through some of the trees, away from the others.

Shine knew it had to be bad.

But when Rumi told her about her...fight with Ren, Shine was stunned. It seemed kind of personal...but then the part about the LOV made that make sense.

Rumi didn't even dwell on Ren's part in it, just said that he was giving her s--- over it.

Shine heard his points though, and Rumi presented them in the biased way annoyed people usually do, but Shine could read between the lines fairly well.

"Ren is worried about you," she summed it up.

"As if I need it," Rumi scoffed.

"You don't have to do that with me," Shine said gently, wondering if the woman would ever let her guard down even for a second.

To her surprise, Rumi suddenly slumped slightly.

"Yeah, well...so maybe I'd thought of all the things he said too," she said, "most of it, and the rest of it was pretty d--- convincing. Maybe I am pushing my luck here. I don't even know what would ever make those weirdos change their tactics."

"The question of the hour," Shine said. "But, if you already thought of it, didn't you decide what to do before?"

"I could be wrong..." Rumi almost mumbled.

Shine choked back a laugh. It was hard enough for the hero to admit she made a mistake.

"This whole thing has really put you out of your zone," she said instead.

"Don't patronize me, Likstar. I'm not a kid," Rumi said.

"Sorry, uh, I just meant to be understanding," Shine said, "Rumi, I don't even have a comfort zone anymore. I just do what I need to do, so I feel like this a lot."

"Like...what?"

"Like I don't know what I'm doing... Geez, if you don't feel that way most of the time, I'd like to know your secret," Shine said, "We all have to grow though. But Ren's concern makes sense to me too. I can't say I've never thought of all of what he said. Down to the part about AFO."

"Really? That much," Rumi said, "I thought over-analyzing was his thing."

"No, I have a lot of free time. He's right, you know. You could be in danger," Shine said.

Rumi bit her lip. "I should leave, then."

"Is that what you think you should do?" Shine said.

"I don't know," Rumi admitted, "I usually know. It seemed so clear before. Actually, I thought this mission was going pretty well, and nothing really bad had happened around them, so maybe it was the right idea. But Ren has a point. All that could go away instantly. We can't trust them."

Shine was silent for a bit.

"You agree with that?" Rumi said.

"I... There're two kinds of trust," Shine said, "There's 'I trust you to do what you said', and that's good...but there's also 'I trust you to know the right thing to do.' And that's a lot harder. And it's rarer. And... people can be really inconsistent about it. It's easier to tell someone what to do, and know they'll do it, then to know, on their own, they'll do the right thing."