Her movements were much more nimble than they had been two days earlier. She had replaced the bandage on her head, and the medical adhesive above her left eye had dried completely. The skin around the wound was beginning to close, and it itched a little. She knew that meant new flesh was growing, so she resisted the urge to scratch.
Guy woke up.
Noise hadn't woken him. His body clock had roused him at precisely six thirty in the morning.
The first thing he did when he opened his eyes was look at Chisen-Chisen was awake, leaning against the pine tree and cleaning his hopelessly smeared glasses.
The lens cloth was a clean piece of fabric Neji had found in his ninja tool pouch. Chisen wiped very slowly and carefully. Three minutes passed, and he still hadn't finished cleaning one lens. It wasn't because the lens was too dirty, but because his hands were still shaking. He wiped once, paused, and waited for his hand to steady before wiping again.
"Your hands are still shaking." Guy sat down beside Chisen, stating it rather than asking.
"That's normal.
"The nervous system needs time to recalibrate." Chisen put on his glasses. Water marks on the lenses formed several curved rainbows in the sunlight, and his eyes blinked behind them. "They should stop shaking sometime this afternoon.
"But I can't use chakra-that will take longer to recover.
"Until the nervous system reestablishes its electrochemical balance, chakra flowing through the meridians will interfere with it. In mild cases, that means dizziness. In severe cases, it could throw my nervous system into disorder again.
"So for at least the next two months, I can't use any ninjutsu."
"Two months." Guy repeated the number, then reached out to take a freshly filled bowl of medicinal