2022-02-22: Simpler Times, Not Better Times
- Log: 2022-02-22: Simpler Times, Not Better Times
- Cast: Sayla Mass, Guy Shishioh, Akane Shinjo
- Where: BAR-Lazy Sidewalk, Tsutsujidai
- OOC - IC Date: 21 February 0096
- Summary: After the battle with Renais and Anti, Sayla and Guy catch up for the first time in years to swap information. They end up reminiscing, looking toward the future, and feeling old as hell.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
That evening, with the Saint Lance shoved safely in Rikka's backyard, with a tarp over it, Sayla has had time to have a shower, get changed into a spare outfit- something casual for her. Black skirt, black heels, purple blouses with and brown scarf tied loosely. She waiting at a decent bar, with low traffic. It has all the ambience of a place that is here, and exists, but you can gloss right over. Which is convenient and suspicious all at once. She has a corner table, in the dimly lit room.
There's an empty ashtray on the table, and Sayla has a carafe of water, two glasses- one of water, one other- and one glass of scotch, which she's sniffed, taken a sip of, sniffed again and put to one side. She'll order again when her guest gets here.
So for now, she waits, thumbing through a book. It appears to be about newtypes, and the author some kind of Dr. She quickly jots in it with a pen. Pauses, makes several lines, and then a quick note.
Those familiar with how Sayla writes can tell she's just jotted down 'bullshit'.
<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.
Tsutsujidai...what an unusual place. He's been here before, he now knows. It's...strange, in ways he'd have trouble articulating. It makes his Evoluder body react in a way he's never experienced before. Just the first layer is the extremely strange radio traffic, but even that...
Regardless. GaoFighGar has been returned to the Wadatsumi, while the team there rapidly gathers information. They're planning an operation to breach back out with the Gatling Driver in the morning, which shhhhould work. Or else they just all suddenly wake up in the sky over G-Island; they don't have anyone qualified enough in dimensional boundary science to give them better than even on that one. So Guy has a few hours to spend catching up with old friends.
He steps in, standing out like a sore thumb in the sea of Normalcy with his strong stance, six-ish feet of height, colorful gold vest jacket, and head of auburn hair that reaches his knees. He finds Sayla soon enough, holding his hand up in a wave as he approaches. "Sayla," he says, with his handsome grin, before slipping into an opposite seat for conversation. He helps himself to the water, first. Guy is...not quite as prone to subterfuge. He doesn't even think twice before downing half of it. Then again he might be invincible? Possibly? Even he doesn't know that one.
"Good to see you. Looks like you're doing well!" Guy Shishioh remains an incurable optimist, apparently.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Sayla waves back. She didn't poison the water, it's fine, and she wouldn't want to. She likes, or at least six years ago liked guy. She gives a friendly nod and invites him to sit, unnecessarily. "And you still look ever the implacable hero." She smiles. "It's good to see you again, even if I wish it was under better circumstances." But better circumstances are so rare.
"Can I get you a drink?" By which she waves to the bartender. Sayla is rich enough to not get up for bar service is she doesn't want to. "You might be surprised what's behind the bar." She doesn't know if Guy actually... needs a drink the way she does. "My treat."
She sits back in a seat a bit, before speaking again. "I'm sorry. That I couldn't do more to help your cousin. There'll be another chance, I hope, but..." But how much damage could she do in the meantime. She shakes her head. "...What happened to her?" They came to exchange information, after all and Sayla is... bad at keeping off task.
<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.
It's quite possible this is their first time meeting in person since the terrifying and miraculous day when the New Machine Species Zonuda nearly destroyed everything - and when Guy and Mikoto were reborn as Evoluders. With a young human body instead of a 99% experimental robot body that swung wildly between 'profoundly superhuman' and 'going to keel over dead at any second', he looks good, and healthy! Happier, too, really.
"Hah, they have motor oil? HyoRyu always told me I should try Piggy's specials." Piggy was, as a reminder, the little simple-AI automaton dressed up like a soda jerk waitress that served the Brave robots in the Big Order Room. "But I'll do a whiskey, I think. Start off strong."
Guy Shishioh actually has a lot less experience Drinking than you might think from his numerical age, may be inferred. He does not give off the impression of being deeply burdened...on the surface, anyway.
Maybe some of that comes out as she asks the million dollar question. Guy deflates, just a little, a rueful look on his face. "Not just her," he says. "The short version's pretty much what I gave you. The long version's...a bit much to swallow." He chuckles. "And we'll probably both want our drinks first. What do you know about when we left? Did you see Mamoru Amami and Ikumi Kaidou's report on the events in the Trinary Solar System?"
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
"As a doctor, I still don't recommend drinking motor oil." He does seem to be doing better but, things were busy. Whatever happened worked for him. And then he says start off strong, that's a bad sign. "The bottle of the eighteen year and two glasses," she asks the bartender.
"...No, I knew about it in passing but I didn't get the chance to read it personally." There was so much happening then. It was so easy to lose track...
She decides not to rush Guy, pouring the drinks herself. She sniffs it first... this one smells right, at least. "You don't have to worry about what you say here. The people here tend to ignore anything that happened after '79." That's going to be a question later, but she can forward some documentation.
<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.
Guy nods to her advice, all of it. "It's been busy, I understand. It's not that important, it'd just brace you a bit for where this goes."
He does have the good god damn sense to sip instead of slam. He blinks at her comment on the people ignoring things. "They did seem a little flat..." Guy's understanding of what he knows as the Limpid Channel is weak, especially compared to Mikoto, but he can certainly tell that it also is strange here. He scratches his cheek. "The big ones I thought were the guardian Kaiju didn't even twitch when Reine Noire showed up, though...guess I misunderstood something about the place."
He settles back in his seat. He's told this story a few times now, but...he needs to get the information out there. "The Trinary Solar System is where we got off to. I'll spare you the details, I'm sure you've heard at least why we did what we did, and what that actually was. What we didn't know for sure before setting out was that the Trinary Solar System wasn't just, another galaxy, another dimension, something like that. It was our universe, in a previous form of its life. The previous universe, before the Big Crunch that ended it and the Big Bang that started this one. And once we defeated the 11 Sol Masters there, we were trapped there. We sent Mamoru and Ikumi home on our last two ES Missiles, and then started working to figure out how to get home. We found a way within Genesic GaoGaiGar, but we'd only found that less than a day ago. We didn't have all the information."
He shrugs, gamely. "So we just pointed it at 'the future', and hoped. Where we ended up was...Orange Site." He takes another sip of his drink just saying the phrase. "An impossibly huge vortex of energy...everything about the previous universe, compressed into a tiny space and growing ever smaller, which would eventually lead to the singularity that sparked our universe's Big Bang."
He motions. "You see why I thought you'd want your drink," he says with a chuckle. "And why I felt the preamble matters." Because he hasn't actually hooked this up to what happened to Renais yet.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Sayla nods. "That bad, huh." Sayla's tone implies she is getting used to 'that bad'. "...Yeah. There's a lot of questions about this place, but the people here feel almost... Hollow, compared to everywhere else." It's no secret that Sayla's a newtype. The Federation made a big deal after the One Year War.
And then Guy explains. Sayla sort of stares at him. And then she slams her drink. She seems barely affected. She didn't drink like that before the Zonuda. She drank, but not like that. She pours herself another.
"...I'd say that's unfathomable, but the past month has been full of impossible events." A sip, this time. Sayla seems somewhat relaxed, surprisingly. Maybe it's talking to another goddamn adult. Maybe it's because it's someone from before. Maybe it's because whatever happened to the rest, Guy is still Guy.
"I'm sitting in a town that went as if the One Year War was the last war, I've met eight people who never existed, one of whom says he's from another universe and at this point I'm inclined to believe him, someone I haven't seen in a little over five years has turned up to fight Kaiju- though that's kind of expected- and a Britannian Princess has come to me with a genuine and earnest intent to help people." She pauses, realizing she's gone *way* off base.
"Tell me what happened, without couching it like I won't believe it. And don't pretend like you have to put on a face about it. You don't. It's not weak to show a friend how you're doing."
Oh. She caught that earlier.
<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.
"Hollow..." Guy murmurs, and nods. "The radio traffic is strange. Low civilian band, just...nothing, on police or military...there shouldn't be anywhere on Earth it's that good."
Guy may be a Brave and an optimist, but blind hope that there's literally anywhere that the police and military are silent isn't courage, it's just ignorance. He scratches the side of his head, a bit awkward, at Sayla's bold confidence. "Sorry," he says, though he doesn't clarify for what. Maybe just, his absurd life. "I'll try to keep it short. You'll remember the reports we filed on The Power. It turns out Orange Site is its wellspring." He doesn't explain that further; as asked, he trusts her to understand the implications.
"Which is how this became a problem. The rift was widening. If it got bigger, it'd keep getting bigger, and eventually it'd run the universe from end to end like a stocking. So..." Sip. Long one. Eyes closed as he puts it down, shoulders slumping heavily. "So we decided to close it. Everyone did. From the inside, so it couldn't threaten the universe anymore."
He shakes his head. "It hit right before the operation. That energy there, at Orange Site, it's called Oath Over Omega. Triple Zero. A principle surpassing beginnings and endings. If you're stuck in it for too long it gets in your head. Puts its principle at the top of your priorities. And from there you break your own thoughts. So they did. They suddenly were trying to stop me. Even J couldn't resist for more than a minute or two longer than anyone else. I...we're still working on why I got out. Galeon forced me to Fusion Out, and then my parents - you'll remember what happened with them in The Power, they were there - managed to secure me. Somehow. I guess they had some power over it.
His finger circles the rim of the glass. "And that's basically the last thing I knew before I sensed the dimension fault that let me cut back through a few weeks ago."
"So...it's not just Renais. It's everyone. The whole of the old Gutsy Galaxy Guard."
He doesn't say Mikoto's name, but he drinks a mouthful afterward, face curling at the taste.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Sayla just... listens. She's good at that. She gives a silent nod. She has enough to go on there. That change in Guy's body language is so obvious. It says so much. Her eyes widen as he explains with Galeon, and his parents and...
"All of them..." She knows what Guy's not saying. Not even with newtype powers. She knows because she's exactly the same with Amuro... and they weren't nearly as close at the end. It doesn't rip your heart out any less. It doesn't hurt any less. It's awful and the scar never heals, but this is a fresh wound people keep jabbing in to, not even having the chance to scab over.
There are times for listening. There are times for talk. And there are times for action. Wordlessly, quietly, Sayla stands up and walks around the table. Guy's tall enough that there's not a huge difference even when she's standing. And then she wraps her arms around him in a firm hug.
<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.
Guy's face is down, and maybe it says it all that he doesn't even look up as she stands, struggling with something deep and dark and cold.
The arms around him are a surprise, on a few levels, but he still relaxes a few hairs at the comfort of it, leaning in toward Sayla as much so she doesn't have to bend as anything. That's him, though. The unflappable King of Braves...everyone else's rock.
"Thanks," he says, quietly. "We'll get them back. Still...working on the details, but GGG Blue's as smart as we ever were. I have faith in their courage."
An old saying, for Guy, and maybe as much of a mantra for himself as anything.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Guy may need to be everybody's rock, but even the King of Braves needs people to care about and for him. And he doesn't right now. And he can't show it anywhere else. So Sayla holds the hug longer. "...If anyone can, it's you. But you're fighting your team, even to save them." She pauses. "And the people you love. That's a fight that destroys you." Sayla's trying to be careful, but she's speaking from experience. "You don't have to bear it alone. Some of us are still here to help. And I'll be damned if I leave you to struggle through it alone because you need to appear invincible."
Eventually, though, Sayla lets go, only to pat Guy on the shoulder once. "I know some people who might be able to help too. And someone you might want to talk to. When you're ready to save them, you can count on me." She walks around to sit across from Guy again. "And if you need to talk, you know how to get in touch."
You can't keep bearing these burdens, a part of Sayla thinks to herself. And maybe she can't. But she couldn't live with herself if she didn't.
<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.
Guy has a somewhat brittle smile on his face afterward, nodding with a bit less than his usual vigor. That is his version of showing it, really. "I know," he says. "Everyone's been very supportive. I appreciate it, I do."
He sets his hand on Sayla's, on his shoulder, patting it in acknowledgment. "It's going to be a project. But we'll keep fighting. I have GGG Blue in my corner, and that includes Mamoru, Kaidou, and alot of other people I've known my whole life. We'll figure it out. And when we do, I'll let you know."
He doesn't bring up the Crusher. Sayla probably doesn't know about that, but explaining it is a whole other train of thought he doesn't quite want to visit right now. The plan he's working on with the Dreisstrager crew will do for now.
"So, actually, we sort of brushed past it, but..." He motions around. "What is this place? I blacked out after J-Ark attacked PLANT and ended up here, once. Then this time there was a dimensional fracture over Nouvelle Tokyo. I had half convinced myself it was a dream, but here we are."
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Sayla just gives a warm smile. There's a lot that's changed. She's glad he's got people. Even if she's had five years he hasn't... That explains why he hasn't changed. "Okay."
Sayla nods. Guy's been up front with her. And it would come up eventually. "This place is called Tsutsujidai. It's.." She pauses, again. "It's a place that doesn't exist, as best as I can make of it. It's like a ward of Tokyo where everything after the One Year War didn't happen. No Titans, no Primevals, no Britannian Invasion, to Axis Shock..." Sayla trails off a bit as she tamps down that emotion. Guy doesn't need to deal with that right now.
"The locals don't seem to recognize anything. And if what I've been told is right, that battlefield will be completely repaired tomorrow morning and almost no one will remember it, or the attack, or us fighting it. Or..." She pauses. Guy said something to Renais that caught her attention. She has to confirm. "Or Gridman, but... keep quiet about that." She wants to see how Guy responds. "As for the dreamlike nature... You fall asleep coming here. Or going." Which is why she pulled up so suddenly. "If it weren't for the fact that this place felt so... wrong, it would be nice to stay here."
She pauses. "There's other things, too." She picks up the glass she put aside. "This is a 10-year-old scotch from a Brewery that was destroyed and shut down thirteen years ago." She places it in front of Guy. "And it tastes wrong. Not poisoned, or anything. But just... unlike it should, in small ways. A little too strong, the flavours don't gel quite right, but you can tell what it's trying to be." She shakes her head. "There's lots of little things like that. The fashion lacks pop, but matches what we expect. The media is in line with ours but only the older things seem to get pushed..."
She sighs deeply. "I don't know what it means yet, if anything. But... It feels so close and yet so far." She downs the rest of her scotch. "Maybe I'm searching for meaning where there is none, but I think this means something."
<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.
Guy hums, the new topic helping him recover some center. "That explains why nobody seemed to recognize me," he says, thoughtfully. "Not used to nobody pointing me out in the street, anymore." Especially now that he's back and the news he's not a supervillain is only kind of circulated.
"Completely repaired...I'd heard that part. Seems pretty convenient, but hearing it from two sources makes it sound more likely." Gridman... He cocks his eyebrow at that. And rather than keep quiet, he brings it up. "What do you know about that? I was advised to keep quiet about the kaiju on the horizon, too, I remember."
You fall asleep coming and going... "Does match my experience so far. Even ramming our way through, I recorded a few seconds of lost sensors." She places the bottle in front of him and he considers it. "Huh. Guess I wouldn't know to spot a thing like that. That's..."
He strokes his chin thoughtfully. "Hm. It sounds like...a human kind of difference, don't you think? Or, maybe not necessarily human, but, conscious. If this were somehow a copy generated by some, I don't know, cosmic process, I'd expect something 'wrong' to be more like rivers made of toffee or the sky being pink, not slight differences in civilization."
He sips his drink again, eyes pinning the wall over Sayla's head. "When we got the signal, we were thinking of doing an operation to rip open the space with the Dimension Pliers, but I don't think it's a good idea if it's inhabited. The Pliers aren't...delicate."
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Sayla lets out a small laugh. "Some people recognize me, but don't make a deal out of it, in fact only one person even approached me was..." She pauses. Something's not quite adding up. On it's own, it's an odd factor, in conjuction... "A friend of a girl who I spoke with here." Wheel's are turning. Turning faster
Fine. Guy has some of the cards. She has some. She's loathe to do it, but... The flop is on the table, it's time to flip them over. "...I worked with him, briefly, around six or seven years ago. Both Gridman and his brother, Sigma. It was a complicated situation." That's one card. Guy can flip the next.
"It was pure chance. I was shopping, and saw a snack Leina used to like but I couldn't get any more. I bought it, thinking there would be a new supplier- but the factory was completely destroyed in the invasion, and the company didn't survive it. But it wasn't old stock."
Guy posits a theory. "...It does. But that's more your experience than mine, Guy. I deal in charity work these days. I'm just trying to find a pattern that I can make sense of." She is not sure she wants to imagine rivers made of toffee. Sayla liked swimming and that would ruin it.
"Please don't. The people here may read strangely but they're still people. If this is it's own space, like you suggest..." She trails off. Guy can definitely fill in the rest himself. She changes topic. "...Guy. If the woman in the Mazin unit was your cousin..." She takes a breathe. "Is she from Chausser? I know it was aligned with GGG somehow." She sighs. "I think she may have had contact with a girl here. And... I'm a bit concerned."
<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.
Wheels turning indeed. Guy's eyes narrow a little. One person approached her, huh. Not necessarily a pattern...
And then Sayla comes forward, and Guy nods, eyes casting down to the last of his drink. "Both, huh," he says. "I've never worked with Gridman until today. But I've worked with Sigma. He was working with us in the Trinary Solar System." Along with Takeshi Todo, but that's not his secret to divulge. "Helped us a lot. That Fixer Beam is something else. ...he's with the rest of them, right now." He slugs back the last of his drink, because sometimes you're drinking for dramatic punctuation. He makes a face because he's an incredible child in some ways, but then says, "We think he was working with Entouji when they launched a cyber-attack on us during the fight with J-Ark at PLANT. They're a real scary team."
...that might be a bit of a bombshell, itself. He brushes onward to later points, nodding to Sayla's admission of inexpertise. "The Zonders loved dimensional fissures. We used the Pliers a lot, as you'll remember. But nothing like this. Closest I've ever seen was the Repli-Earth in the Trinary Solar System, but we know what caused those imperfections, and that problem is solved."
He can and does fill in the blanks and follows Sayla on the transition. "Yes. Renais Cardiff-Shishioh, agent of Chasseur. We were working together a lot on BioNet issues before we left." ...a girl here.
...a girl here who knows Renais. And who seems to have a knack for homing in on strangers.
Guy's eyes tick to Sayla's, and the gears are turning behind them. "Is this girl named Akane Shinjo?"
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Sayla pauses. "So... Sigma was..." There's a sudden moment of... fear in Sayla's eyes, that she can't hide. She tries to hide it well everywhere else, but... "...Was Takeshi Todo still working with him?" She didn't know the exact deal, but she had Takeshi's file, from her predecessor in the Alliance. One of the world's best spenders in High School, and a dangerous threat until Gridman and his team stopped him. He seemed to turn it around, but if he hasn't...
"I'd heard about that, but..." Oh hell. They're working together. Of course they are but... Things are rapidly escalating that Sayla doesn't have time to consider the sheer insanity of 'Repli-Earth'.
Sayla simply nods. "...She told me she kept an eye out for 'outsiders'.So far I've been trying to stick to act like... this history here was correct." It's a nice lie. Quietly, she pulls out her phone, placing it on the table, to type out a message. "...Why don't we test a hypothesis, Guy? That tells me you've talked to her already."
>Miss Shinjo, I'm sorry to bother you, but I think I've encountered an outsider. Long brown hair, yellow vest, confident smile, in his 20s? Does he sound familiar? I don't think I can take a photo subtly. -Sayla
"...That said, given how lonely she seems, I can understand why she'd approach any new face that looked half trustworthy." The way Sayla says that, is she trying to explain that to Guy... or convince herself?
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
A DIFFERENT SPACE (it's just Akane's room)
Akane glances over, hearing the buzz of her phone. With an irritated sigh, she slumps on over to it, prying herself out of six separate garbage bags.
She picks up the phone, and looks at the text. Despite herself, she texts back immediately.
> I think he said his name was Guy... Oh, right, he's related to the woman who was saying all the weird stuff. I think he said they were cousins or something.
> All my friends are okay.
<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.
Guy seems to uncoil a little when she says Takeshi's name. Losing the friend still hurt, but Guy's poker face is the type where you usually put his head in a blackout visor if you need him to lie. He's much more comfortable being open. Still, the possibility seems to chill Sayla, so he just keeps her gaze. "He was, yeah."
No need to speak up in defense of his character; it's a bit futile, right now.
Guy nods to Sayla's plan for a test, though he doesn't particularly...seem to grasp what she's getting at. "She seemed nice enough. Got me coffee. She was real worried about Renais. Seemed like all she wanted to talk about."
He hums to himself, then raises his hand to order a beer, because this is not a Get Completely Wasted kind of reunion. "And she's skipping school," he says, as if these are equal concerns in his mind.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Damnit. "...I see." She changed the protocols after Master Asia turned on them, and kept changing them. Kept refining them. Making them as secure as she could. She was doing double duty as comms and intelligence. "Thank you for telling me."
Sayla pauses. "...Did she now?" Hm. "...When she talked to me, she just mentioned her as a random outsider. And when I mentioned you right now... She's being vague." That's concern, clear on Sayla's face. "She told me that too- When I asked if everything was okay, she shifted the topic to those big Kaiju outside though. Did she tell you she could see them?"
>I'm glad to hear that. How are you doing? -Sayla
She leans back. "I wish I knew more... but it sounds like we're both hitting the limits of our knowledge." Sayla lets out a huge sigh. "Do you remember when things weren't so... confusing? When Doctor Hell would just march into a public plaza, rant, and then Doctor Kabuto would and friends would just fight it out?" Sayla orders vodka this time. Neat. Again. "It feels strange to be nostalgic for a wartime, but there you go." She looks out, towards Tsutsujidai. "...But at the same time, it's a little nice to pretend it all didn't happen for a while. Even if I can't believe the lie."
Sayla might have had... one or two before Guy got here, too.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Akane frowns. She's doing garbage, but Sayla doesn't need to know that.
> I'm fine. ... Do you know anything about the thing that attacked that wasn't a kaiju?
It's a question she needs to plan around the answer to. ... maintaining this lie is getting difficult already.
<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.
"Of course," Guy says, with that confident smile of his. "Wish I'd known to get in touch with you sooner."
Guy's own face turns concerned, as Sayla lays it out. "She did seem like she thought a lot about what to say to people? She didn't tell me she could see them until I brought them up."
Guy, being the incurable hero he is, murmurs, "I wonder if she's stuck here, somehow...but no, she doesn't seem like she wants to leave..." His gaze turns inward as his drink arrives.
Sayla's reminiscence earns a chuckle. "Someone gets mad about traffic on G-Island City, runs into a Zonderian, and before I know it he's flattening the highway with a steamroller the size of a city block?" He laughs. "I don't know if they were better times. Simpler, maybe. But maybe we just solved the simple problems first."
His smile grows, and the strength in his eyes grows with it. "It'd be easy to say the new problems are for the new generation. Mamoru, Kaido, Hana, even little Alouette isn't so little anymore. They're all strong and wonderful Braves. But I want to be part of it, too."
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
"...She's asking if I know anything about Renais' unit." Sayla pauses, how to respond.
>I think it had something to do with this man- Guy's- cousin. I don't know the full picture. -Sayla
She should probably have thought to ask before sending that. "I don't think she does either. But she's not so flat like everyone else here. Sayla sighs, taking her vodka and taking a sip. A long sip. "That's true... Simple doesn't mean better."
And then Guy interrupts Sayla's melancholy with talk of the new generations and that makes Sayla genuinely laugh, with actual humour and joy. "The new generation, Guy? You're... somewhere in your 20s and I'm in my early 30s. We're not tired old husks, no matter what the times would have us believe." She takes another sip, this one more measured. "There's way too much work left to do to dump it on the kids who came after us. We clean up our problems, so we can help them with theirs. And then they can do the same. That's the way it should be, making things better for everyone who comes after." Sayla's getting idealistic, and a little red faced, but only a little. "You can't be an jovial old man before I'm a stubborn old lady in a house full of cats, Shishioh."
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
OVER IN AKANE'S BEDROOM AGAIN
... Is that enough to go on? If Sayla's encountered, Akane thinks, it probably has to be. They're gonna get to talking...
> He said something bad happened to her.
ugh, Akane thinks to herself. Almost asked for help there. And it's not like that even makes sense -- Guy's gonna do something about his cousin no matter what, and if he and Ms. War Hero are talking, Sayla's probably going to do something about it too. So why ask? It's gonna get dealt with.
> I... think I kind of get it, if that was her attacking. From what Guy said, and what she said, and that, there's like... an... assertion? A rule? About the world in her brain? And it's making her do stuff. ... I don't like it.
That's... probably the sum total of what she can safely guess at. It's better if she's offering something, she thinks -- she doesn't *need* help, she *is* the help. Or at least, she's not useless. Maybe.
<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.
Guy laughs, a loud, easy belly laugh. "Sorry! Sorry, you're right. Best anyone can figure, I'm barely any older than Mamoru, now, despite how much he's grown. I guess talking with Tetsuya had me thinking like an old man." He sighs, a sound of a satisfied spirit, and settles back in his seat, looking around for the first time with curiosity in his spirit. "His wife's expecting, did you hear?" He smiles. He's been rattled, that much is clear. But he still has that confidence in his smile, when he needs it. That bottomless wellspring of courage that made him such a powerful bearer for the G-Stone. "You're right. I'm not even close to out yet!"
As for Akane, he hems, tipping his head. His Evoluder senses can tell the conversation is going on, even if he can't - or at least is respecting boundaries enough to not even attempt - to read them in the air. Still: "She's responding fast," he says, which is not information that should be visible to him.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Sayla's eyes widen. "Expecting?" She leans back in that chair with an exaggerated sigh. "I cannot find a person who will stick it out for more than a night or two and Tetsuya Fucking Tsurugi is settling down and having a kid." She laughs. "With Jun, or...?"
Oh. He caught that one. Sayla gives guy a little bit of stink eye, but only a little. "She is. I guess she's not busy."
> It sounds awful... Having your own beliefs stolen. I need to leave town tomorrow, do you want to talk next time I'm back? -Sayla
Sayla finishes her drink, seeming a lot better for the talk. "Time moves on, huh? Leina's starting university soon, Mamoru's an adult and Tetsuya Tsurugi is going to go home and be a family man." She looks up at the ceiling, wistfully for a moment, then she looks very seriously at Guy.
"So, how many cats do you think you can carry?"
She keeps a straight face until Guy breaks or she does.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Ughgnhg don't commit, you feel like garbage and you'll feel even more like garbage if you have to break it off -- and what if you finally kill a Vessel of Light and close the space back up --
> Sure. Just give me some warning, okay?
... that's about all the texting she can do tonight. She needs to sulk this loss off and figure out who to blame for it. She slides back out of her chair and into the garbage...
... and notices melted giri-choco on her thigh. The first time she'd flopped down, it wasn't warm; now her body heat has warmed it, and, well. "Oh, come on," she groans. ... yeah, she's just not gonna get up for a bit.