2022-03-05: Haunted by Doubt
- Log: 2022-03-05 Haunted by Doubt
- Cast: Renais Cardiff, Sayla Mass
- Where: Tenchu Orbital Elevator, Orbital Ring
- OOC - IC Date: March 5, 2022 (0096)
- Summary: At the top of the Orbital Elevator, a woman looks down at the Earth she intends to extinguish. And then someone comes to try and talk her out of her unbreakable conviction.
<Pose Tracker> Renais Cardiff has posed.
It's said that when the first astronauts went to space, it changed their view of the world. A world without borders, a fragile speck in the sunlight. Something that needed protecting.
Renais had felt it herself once--a few months ago, by her measure. The effect was a bit diminished by humanity's slow spread outward, but... it was very real.
But now, looking out over the curve of the Earth from one of La Tour's observation decks, she wondered why she'd ever felt that way. There's a bitter aftertaste to the view, like burnt coffee, as spaceships and mobile workers mill about in the distance. She watches quietly, enhanced eyes zoomed in on a mobile worker. In her imagination, the pilot's one of the 'victims' of life's suffering, rather than one of the oppressors. She wonders at their pain.
After all, everyone hurts. Some merely hide it more deeply than the rest.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
It's easy to see the world down there as small and fragile. Or as an oppressive force. Or as something cracked and broken and useless. Something dying, that requires sudden, brutal intervention to save it, no matter the cost.
Sayla doesn't much care for the view anymore. It raises too many questions. What Master Asia saw back then. What Casval saw, what Amuro saw. Besides, the big picture can get too big sometimes. You need to zoom in, and change the angle. Look outward rather than in. Not that outward is great either. The vast emptiness of the stars.
No, these days Sayla prefers lots of little pictures. Old and new, from everywhere. She can look at the big picture any time. The little pictures keep you grounded. Those are where you see the details.
Details like the woman watching space sadly. The hurt radiating off her. The sadness. Sayla could approach her in many ways. Her trusty pistol sits under her jacket. MAYBE she could just resolve this.
But she promised Guy. And it's too high a gamble. That's not the solution. Instead, Sayla does nothing to mask her approach. She walks up next to Renais- not too close. She speaks *just* loud enough to be heard, without being overhead. "Miss Cardiff?" She pauses about how to approach this. "My name's Sayla. I'm a friend of your cousin's. Would you like to talk?" A hard approach won't work her. Being 'strong' isn't the solution. Being open is. Hopefully Renais will respond.
<Pose Tracker> Renais Cardiff has posed.
Renais is simmering. It's a different feeling, more akin to hearing a talk show pundit yelling on a radio in the next room. It's, in fact, a bit quieter, duller than one might expect.
She picks out the sound of Sayla's approaching footsteps, eyes readjusting and glancing over toward the sound. Her head barely moves--just enough to give her a peripheral look.
Her less visible hand shifts, poised to reach into her coat; a quick inventory of what's in quick reach, what's quietest. A confrontation here could be ugly--and that's not counting the fact that her most viable exfiltration strategy involves blowing open a window into hard vacuum in one of the most heavily-trafficked areas of the Earth Sphere.
Not ideal.
She's wary, and intently focused on the woman who's now standing beside her, finally turning her head to meet Sayla's gaze before the woman speaks. Her eyes are intense, and would betray her readiness for fight-or-flight even if her mind didn't. "..."
Sayla. That name. That face... that's--
"Tch. Guy's got friends in high places." She's impressed, but not surprised. Her lips turn up in a brief ghost of a grin, and her guard lowers, just slightly. "... Yeah. I can talk."
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Sayla nods. In some ways, there's few places safer than the the Tenchu orbital elevator for this. Secure, well guarded, hard to start a fight. Unless you don't care about collateral whgich Renais mightn't. Still, she can't pass up a chance opportunity like this. "Thank you."
Honestly Sayla hadn't expected to get this far. It's a surprise. Which means she has to work out... what the hell to say here. "I'm also acquainted with a young lady who seems very worried about you. And what you're doing." She's lowered her guard once, but this is a risky play.
"...I've been given the cliff notes version." She says, cautiously. "But I'd like to know why you've come to the conclusion you have. Why this is the only option." She has the chance to ask this time. It's arrogant to think there's something Guy missed, but... She thinks differently from the GGG. She sees the world differently. Maybe that might give her a clue, or a hint.
Or maybe that's a lie she tells herself that when they can't be saved, she at least tried.
<Pose Tracker> Renais Cardiff has posed.
Renais doesn't care about collateral damage, particularly, but she knows opsec and strategy. Making a scene at such a high-value location escalates the stakes, raises general alert levels against them, and most importantly:
It makes it harder for her to find some goddamn tranquility.
Not that she's been successful, today, thanks to Sayla's presence. Her eyes widen a little at Sayla's mention of a 'young lady', and what starts out as confusion turns to realization, then to a distinct melancholy. Of course Akane's reaching out. This must be as insane to her as it is to the rest of the world.
"I see."
She turns to face Sayla and slips her left hand--the golden gauntlet--into her pocket, mulling over what she's been asked. The right still stands poised to move. Her guard's not going all the way down.
"I assume you want *my* reasons, not simply the ones we all share," she replies, voice tinted with a distinct French accent.
A pause, then a sigh. Annoyed, perhaps a little resigned.
"Or perhaps you want both. First... *why* do you want to know?" she asks, one eyebrow raised, her head tilted ever-so-slightly to one side. "You're not looking to be convinced."
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
For all Sayla's body language is calm, she's watching the way Renais' hand dives into her pocket. It could be a gun, not that Renais needs one. Sayla's decently alert, but she's not a cyborg. She keeps herself in a prominent, visible position.
"Your reasons are the most important, right now. You're the person I'm talking to." She's not going to bring up Takeshi at this point. Keep that card up her sleeve. "And the personal reasons matter more than the greater ideal, at least to me." That's the stronger one. The one you can work out an angle of attack on. Without the personal, the group ideal is easier to break.
But that's when you assume something that hasn't rewritten someone's mind to serve it's purpose. Still... rational attacks are all she's got.
"You're right. I'm not. This entire attitude is antethical to mine. I find it abhorrent." Sayla doesn't mince words. There's no point lying to her. And Sayla's got her own frustrations here. She keeps her tone level, but her voice is hard. "But I've had people I care for and trusted embark on a mad quest to kill every person in the Earth Sphere, so I'm uniquely positioned to help Akane through it when you inevitably fail." She could be more generalized, more broad, but no. She needs to strike a specific blow. "Those scars heal slowly. If ever. Do you really want to be the one leaving them?"
<Pose Tracker> Renais Cardiff has posed.
"You--"
Sayla's struck a nerve. Renais grits her teeth. Anger boils up through the simmering static, and the back of her cooling coat shifts slightly, the under-jacket's cooling vanes spreading to compensate for increased heat. The hand at her side trembles as she entertains inadvisable impulses. She's a little bigger, ready to confront...
Her shoulders drop. That slight spread in her coat drops with them. The anger ebbs somewhat, and after an uncomfortably long silence, she looks away. "Ugh."
"My mother was a former BioNet agent... they found her and assassinated her when I was fourteen. Waited until I got home from school, and let me find her dead on the floor before black-bagging me."
There's that pain, again. The trauma Sayla felt pouring off of her in waves before. She looks back toward Sayla.
"They spent two years modifying me. Breaking my mind. Training me to be a killing machine. Unplugged me and left me for dead when they couldn't get me to bow to them... then the old bastard found me and gave me one of these." She pulls her gauntlet halfway out of her pocket, enough to show Sayla the G-Stone on her wrist.
"Do you know what I felt as I lay dying there?" she asks, looking Sayla directly in the eye. "I was relieved. Happy, even. I welcomed death, because were finally *done* with me--no more pain. No more heat. No more torture."
"Why did I go through that? Why did they do that, and why did I feel that?" She's starting to get a little loud--not enough to draw attention, yet. Her mind boils over with a sort of resigned conviction. "The depths of suffering we're capable of mean it's a *mercy*, a necessary act, to make sure that nobody can inflict or feel that suffering again!"
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Sayla stands firm as Renais gets angry. Her eyes bore into Renais'- she's made her stance, she won't back down dye to a threat. Renais looks away. And Sayla can feel it in her words. The pain. She could lower her walls, and let it in. But she won't. Renais words are more than enough.
She also doesn't look away as Renais speaks. She lets the story hit her head on. And it's a brutal one, cruel, and pointless. And while Sayla starts to clench her fist, she stops herself. She's angry, but it isn't her anger.
"I won't lie and say I understand." She could be callous, but her own story would only feed Renais' convictions. "And I won't say you were wrong for wanting it to end." She pauses for a moment. "But your suffering isn't everyone's suffering. What happened to you doesn't mean you get to decide for everyone else." She's... not just talking to Renais there. She's talking to someone else as well. Who isn't in this world any more. Maybe this conversation was selfish.
"Why do the group of you get to decide everyone's fate, when you've only done the quickest part? Fighting gives you the opportunity to alleviate the suffering. And it's vitally important. But it's not the end. There's so much more that comes after it, that no one ever does. The slow work. You've skipped straight ot the fastest solution, rather than the best."
Sayla's hardening again, but she can't pull this one back. "Especially since... even if your plan does succeed, your goals will go unmet." She tries to meet Renais' eyes again. "You're just condemning a significant amount of us to an eternity of suffering in a dead world." She hopes she's ready for this one. It's controversial in Newtype Research circles, but Sayla knows full well it happens. "For some people, death doesn't mean the end of it. They remain here. Anchored. Unable to leave. And unable to change anything."
<Pose Tracker> Renais Cardiff has posed.
Renais lets the first part of the response wash over her. It's nothing she hasn't heard before. "It's the only solution," she starts to explain.
Then Sayla drops what should be a bit of a bombshell.
It's surprising, to be sure, and disrupts her train of thought pretty completely. But the emotion that comes off of her is revelatory--realization, rather than surprise.
She remembers Guy telling her about the visions he saw of his mother--and how The Power had preserved her spirit, as well as his father. This isn't so different, in that way, is it?
But it's definitely disconcerting. Assuming she's telling the truth, would these ghosts be preserved by the Oath Over Omega, or destroyed...? She'll have to ask the old man about it. Ugh.
For now, she shakes her head, after gathering her thoughts. "I don't believe that's going to be an issue. Guy has complicated things, but-- I'm actually surprised he hasn't mentioned this. Flooding the universe with Triple Zero would cause the universe to run from end to end in a matter of moments, and form the embryo of the next. I don't know the physics of it, nor of these ghosts, but... somehow, I don't believe they would survive such a catastrophic breach of reality."
She's not quite as sure as she sounds, and certainly a bit more troubled.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
So it's clear this isn't something you can fight with reason, or logic. She'd been warned. But it's still disconcerting. Upsetting. An awful feeling that Sayla keeps bottled up. She needs to seem at least as resolute. She can feel things start to shift, but this isn't enough. Renais is off balance, but she needs more than doubt.
Sayla is less surprised. She shifted the topic... He needed more than just giving her a briefing. "You don't believe, but you don't know." She drives in on that uncertainty. "If you're doing this to make sure no one suffers again, I'd want to be sure." This is it. This is the moment of utterly cruel play. "After all, what if the one who's left lingering is you? Or your friends? Or the people who care about you so much to reach out to an outsider like me?" Sayla has, frankly, very little on Renais. Not enough relationships. She has to lean on the one she knows and doesn't disdain.
It's at this point Sayla finally turns- not putting her back to Renais, but looking out at the empty stars, the colonies too far away too see. She's betting a lot on this gambit. Now she has to let Renais stew for a few moments more.
<Pose Tracker> Renais Cardiff has posed.
"..."
There's the slightest flinch, a falter, in Renais' expression--but the bottom drops out of her stomach. Sayla can feel that much.
If it were her, stuck for eternity as a ghost... she could accept it. It's a sacrifice, but one she can accept making.
But J? Akane?
J is used to being alone. He's built to be alone. But he *shouldn't be alone.* He'd never admit it, but she knows he needs companionship. And if the rug got pulled out from under him so soon after he'd found it...
As for Akane, she'd never forgive herself. It's one thing to be 'alone' in a world of your own making, with created people and people-likes to provide companionship...
It's quite another to be truly, properly alone, adrift and insubstantial in the dark.
She doesn't know how to handle this. To her, it's largely a hypothetical--the only two she's ever heard of are sustained by The Power--but, hypothetical or not, the nerve's struck.
She doesn't reply. But Sayla can feel the turmoil, the conflict between conscience and implanted directive.
"Gh." She turns to look out at the stars.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Sayla can feel it. For many reasons, it's such a tiny victory. She made Renais flinch,
But when faced with an implacable overriding will, a flinch means something. It means it's not implacable. It means they can doubt. It means they can have second thoughts. It means there is something, however small, they can drive a wedge into and hammer at. And as long as they can't disprove it, that crack's there.
"I don't know what you see when you look out there. You can maybe see moons, maybe Side 1, but there's so much there in the emptiness. But also so little. You could never see the vastness of it with your eyes. How much is truly out there." It seems like Sayla is changing topic, finally. "And it took us a long time to get there. Is this one system. And we know the Zentradi were out there, but it took them so long to find us. Chance, to find a planet."
She takes long slow, breath and says ever so quietly. "How long would it take to find a single stranded soul in our universe by chance? One hundred thousand years? A million? Could they communicate at all?" Her eyes harden. "How long would it take in a universe that's brand new? Maybe some people deserve that... but you don't get to choose who that could happen to." At no point does she try to make eye contact with Renais. She stares out at the stars. She stares out at a specific point. Renais has no reason to know that that point is. But Sayla swears she can feel it. Or tells herself she can.
She stares at where the rainbow faded long ago.
There was a reason she didn't look out at this view.