2022-04-08: I Won't Avert My Gaze
- Log: 2022-04-08: I Won't Avert My Gaze
- Cast: Nanai Miguel, Akane Shinjo
- Where: Tsutsujidai - Train Station
- OOC - IC Date: 0096-04-09
- Summary: "Mesta Mesua" makes an appearance in Tsutsujidai. As one with experience in matters of the heart, she perceives its shape quickly; its Lord-Monster clings to the illusion.
<Pose Tracker> Nanai Miguel has posed.
Every bribe paid means less food on the table for someone else. A ticket that would obviously send a person out to the PLANTs from Sweetwater would most definitely require bribes of the numerous variety.
This is why Nanai Miguel, bearing the Federation credentials that name her as Mesta Mesua, has spent the better part of the last 30 hours in various layovers. There's no crime in someone from Sweetwater visiting family or friends in any number of neutral colonies. The real trick then was to make sure to fly out from said neutral colonies using a service that didn't report back to a Federation database.
Finding out which those are comes out of the spies and informants fund. That one is more difficult to conserve.
"Our final approach to Junius Six will begin shortly. Please remain seated and power down all devices--"
Nanai shuts her laptop with the gentle weight of her hand. She reaches down for her shoulder bag so that she can put her slim computer away and dispose of the tray table, but a moment's passing pressure stops her. Her gaze drifts to the window at the end of her empty row of seats.
There, glimmering in the void, the suggestion-shapes of wreckage. This is why the shuttle's approach took so long. This is why the flight was so empty despite being the only flight scheduled direct to Junius Six this week.
Most traffic routed away from the debris of Junius Seven. For sentimentality? Perhaps some. For the remaining collision hazard, a hazard that would take a generation of cleaning crews to slowly erase? Oh, yes.
The tawny-haired woman sinks back into her chair. She can remember hearing the news of it. Of course it reignited many hearts. Even the chastisement of the Axis Shock couldn't quench all of those whose hearts readied rage for the Federation's excesses. They lost people those years, off to join other causes.
In a way, that is why she is here, chasing a ghost story. She owes it to someone who didn't leave. Rather, someone who chose her cause. Besides: if Shelby is right, this is tragedy of another kind.
Time spins on in the relative silence of a small boat in a big sea. Her mind is blank as she looks at the place where a colony once was. A thought struggles to enter, but she holds it back for a few slow breaths.
What if they had...
No. No one can cross the same river twice.
Nanai shuts her eyes. The thrum of the maneuvering shuttle is a familiar friend to her.
No one can in this world, anyway.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
When Nanai next opens her eyes, she's... still on transit, to be sure -- but not the same transit. The click-clack-click-clack of a train along tracks replaces that familiar shuttle noise. The train is just leaving a foggy space; as it comes out, it comes out into a bright, sunny summer day.
To some spacenoids, the feeling might be a familiar one, though. Lots of colonies stay out of sync with the seasons; Axis's infamous eternal summer and Winter Wonderland's forever-winter... sure, it's a little more season-appropriate as they stretch into April, but these would be near-record temperatures in Nouvelle Tokyo for April. Even the strange weather after Getter Robo's detonation in New Yark barely reached *this* feverish feeling.
- Now arriving at: Tsutsujidai Station West. Thank you so much for riding with Senpuuji Industries today. The doors will be on your right. Now arriving at: ... -
At the very least, this is confirmation that the Shuffle Alliance's broader intelligence on the topic can be trusted.
It's the tail end of spring break. A young lady is getting in some last minute shopping on both sides of town. Her trip has taken her from the east-side station to the west-side station, as of about 20 minutes ago... where she's had the good fortune to run into her friends.
"Jeez, you two are getting kinda clingy... I didn't think Ako was this honest," the pink-to-purple-haired girl amid the group says, with good humor. "Or is it just about getting out of the house?"
One of them -- probably not Ako, from the sound of it; a girl with long brown hair and a bright purple-and-white ribbon -- rubs at the back of her head. "... This was my idea, actually. I needed to get out of the house again. During spring break I don't have dance club as an excuse."
Her gaze is the first to track to the train. Something about it seems to have her attention -- and after a moment, all three of them give the arriving train at least a glance.
They're the only ones, at that; everyone else here feels like they're... going through the motions. The steady shuffle from train platform to train platform. A closed, empty loop, taken with a zero-urgency gait. These three, though, stand out like a beacon amid the stillness -- the gradient-haired, red-eyed girl most of all, of course... but the other two, too, seem just a hair more alert, a hair more attentive, a hair more... *more*.
<Pose Tracker> Nanai Miguel has posed.
Once upon a time, Nanai would sometimes close her eyes and open them to find that she had slept without realizing the passage of time. No more. At least, no more until now.
A different announcer. Nanai opens her eyes and takes in a breath in the same impulse. She doesn't panic. At least, she doesn't panic for values of normal people panicking. Her sharp look up to the speaker and then out the window is, for the oft-laconic woman, a demonstration of aroused alertness.
She remains frozen in her seat for several moments after the train has stopped. A glance down -- her laptop is in her bag, sat in her lap, as if she'd never opened it. A glance up -- the countryside. An Earthside countryside. Unlike many born spacenoids, Nanai spent many years on Earth courtesy of the Federation government.
The wrongness takes a moment to click. She still feels like she's on that shuttle. Alone in the vast ocean, save a few souls... and yet -- a glance behind her, out the window -- there's people. More than she thinks.
It is with the practiced nonchalance of a lifelong dissident that Nanai rises from her seat, slips her coat off her shoulders as if it was the most natural thing for her to have been wearing until now, folds it over her bag, shoulders said bag, and then exits the train.
Her slow, steady pace gives her time to think. She doesn't look at the loudness blaring at her from across the platform. If this is the person that Shelby encountered, that flash of ombre hair, then there is little wonder she freaked. Nanai, by necessity, knows better than most how to wrestle with big feelings. Her automatic footsteps bring her to one of the train route maps.
Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Nanai exhales. Yes, nothing. The vast ocean of space in the middle of a city transit hub.
"Oh," she exhales with her breath, so softly that it barely sounds like a word at all.
This feels like that place. A warmer world.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Those feelings, at least, don't have much *direction* at this stage -- but there's so much unexpressed. Regrets, fears, all like so many clinging hands digging in with fingernails and claws. You'd never know it from the way she seems so comfortable, though -- never see it in the bearing she seems to have with her friends.
"... If you two get *too* close," Akane teases, "we're gonna have another classroom cuddle pile on our hands... I dunno if I can handle that, but it *is* kinda cute."
The third girl -- bleach-blonde with a splash of purple -- puffs out her cheeks a bit, scooting subtly closer to the brunette with the purple ribbon. "I'm not that casual... don't act like I'm just Namiko II." Of course, as she says this, she starts playing with the brunette's long hair a bit, almost nervously -- like she feels like she's gonna get it all grease-slick and dirty just by touching it, but wants to take the risk anyway.
A knowing smirk splits Akane's lips. "... I'll leave you two to it," she says, with a second glance back. That vague sensation, that feeling -- it's tracking toward... the train map? "I'm gonna see if that tourist needs some help."
"There she goes again... jeez, you'd think she has time for everyone but her friends," the blonde murmurs, still a little huffy.
Eyes tracking to the blonde before the rest of her head turns to face, the beribboned girl notes, "... You can be the same way."
Akane makes her way over to the train route map. "Hey there," she says, to the mystery woman. No one else seems to notice the coat. No one else seems to notice... much of anything, honestly. "Looking for anything in particular? I only moved here last February, but I know the city pretty well!." She lets her hands drift behind her back, and clasps one inside the other.
There's a feeling rolling off of her that doesn't match the pleasant, chirpy demeanor at all -- and it barely feels human. It almost feels *draconic* -- not the tone of a human's mental language, but the sensation of talons and tentacles all stretching out. Is it a waking-up stretch? Settling in for a nap? A threat?
You'd need to know the beast.
And speaking of beasts: thirteen silhouettes stand some 70 meters high, against the cityscape. From here, many of them prove easy to spot. All spines and claws and crested heads.
Kaiju... claylike. Inert.
<Pose Tracker> Nanai Miguel has posed.
Nanai's gaze tracks the transit lines. Even if this place is beyond the cold world, it feels important to have a sense of where it claims to be. She's not terribly familiar with Japan, even if her father's side of the family came from thereabouts, but she knows enough to gather a place.
Without moving, her attention tracks up toward the city, and then further toward the skyline. Clouds and shadows. Clouds and kaiju, to be specific. So this is the place.
The loud comes rumbling up to her elbow and she plays it polite enough to not notice until she speaks. Nanai cuts an unimposing figure by several metrics: a woman in her late twenties positioned behind glasses and comfortable, well-worn clothes. Nothing intentionally glamorous. The kind of woman whose resting bitch face can probably be attributed to avoiding men on the train.
"I suppose this is a trip to see what I can see."
Nanai steps back from the map to orient toward Akane for a more polite conversation. Seeing the younger woman with two sets of eyes draws a brief silence, but one that can be played off a moment's consideration.
"My name is Mesta Mesua. What do visitors usually come here to see?"
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
"Hmmm..." Akane picks up the sub-rosa layer of this question fairly quickly, of course; she's gotten used to the comings and goings of visitors, especially ones that feel -- alive, in the way that 'Mesta Mesua' feels alive. "Lately, most people are coming to see the thirteen or so major landmarks in the ward. This place is pretty tired otherwise."
She taps her chin, murmuring, "If you're looking for something to see, though... we've got a lot of really good restaurants. I can't stomach a lot of that stuff, but..." Pausing for just a moment, she reaches into her bag. She pulls out her phone -- it's a cracked, mud-caked thing that looks like it ought not even charge. Yet sure enough, she pulls up a picture of...
... well, you can certainly *see* Ryuutei -- a small hole-in-the-wall Chinese place that also does ramen -- in the picture. If you weren't in the know, that's probably *all* you'd see, albeit from a fair distance out. The kaiju is rather more of the visual frame, though.
"I took it with my drone!" Akane explains, *sounding* happy. The monster inside her remains at an unchanged posture. "I've been doing drone photography lately. What do you think? I could probably get a better picture of the restaurant, but... I think you get a better picture of the city this way." It's a *very* cautious signal.
<Pose Tracker> Nanai Miguel has posed.
The landmarks are precisely vague enough for Nanai to feel comfortable grabbing the implied meaning without further inquiry. It's a soft confirmation.
Yet, as Nanai remains silent to listen to the younger woman go on, it's the only one. Her spontaneous guide skips the name exchange. Nanai's duties are trifurcated: look down at this truly heinous gremlin phone, think back to everything Shelby and the Shuffle Alliance info network shared, and try to keep her currents serene and flowing in the face of this dragon-presence.
Nanai's green eyes impassively take in the kaiju glamour shot. Confirmation, no longer soft.
"I see the interest in your way," she says. Her hand rests on the closed top of her shoulder bag. Behind her, the train begins to pull out. Nanai waits for the noise to die down. Then:
"I think you may have met my friend. She has hair a bit like yours. You bought her coffee and helped her get home."
When someone seems ready to fight, there's two ways to approach them: call their bluff straight on, or move sideways and make them reorient.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Nanai -- Mesta Mesua -- affirms what Akane suspects. This is indeed a visitor, and not just someone traveling from one end of town to the other. That prickle at the back of her neck is a *bit* of a tell -- but the acknowledgment of the kaiju almost always does it.
"Oh!" She nods, saying, "Good." Hair like hers, bought coffee -- ah. Okay. "It sounds like you probably got the same speech I gave her, so, great." She doesn't even need to tell Mesta not to tell other people about the kaiju. They can get right to the interesting part.
Akane's brain seems in a bit of a tug of war between two postures -- and in the end, goes back to one that feels more like at-rest. The monstrousness even starts to attenuate; she feels... well, more like a normal teenage girl again. Still a little scared, still a little worried. At least she parses, now, though.
"Akane Shinjo, though maybe you already knew that," she says, finally moving along. "Looking to see what you can see here, huh... you must be from that other world, too. I can try to help."
She gestures for Mesta to follow her -- out of the train station, at least. "Ako, Marusan," she calls, as she passes them. "This is this lady's first time in town -- I'm gonna help her out! You guys have a good day out, okay?"
That part of the interaction goes off without a hitch; Ako and Marusan -- now both named -- seem sad to see Akane go, but they don't really mind the chance to be alone together, either.
"It seems like everyone's worried a lot about what goes on here..." she reflects. Is Tsutsujidai truly so threatening...?
... is she going to, then, need to regard the outside itself as a threat? She kind of hopes not, at this point...
<Pose Tracker> Nanai Miguel has posed.
Nanai waits to see which way the wave will break. That bright 'Oh!' could be either, but from the good onward she feels the shadow pull back. Somewhat. The realization strikes like a glimmer in the dark: that monster is always on her shoulder.
But how long? And why?
The tawny-haired woman nods twice, once in agreement to the speech given to Shelby, and again to knowing her name. As for coming from the other world, there is no obvious response save for her implicit agreement to being shown around.
Her gaze follows Akane's call to her friends. A flicker passes through her. Memories of her friends at a similar age and disposition, trapped in a place overseen by another kind of monster--
No, no. She can't lose focus. Not in this place, lest she drift.
Nanai positions herself alongside Akane, though to the side enough that she can watch the younger woman out of the corner of her eye and see which way to turn.
"I don't know much about here," she says, contesting the worried mood. "My friend arrived by accident. It seemed unusual, so I wanted to see."
A pause. Nanai glances over.
"You mentioned that you moved here in February. From where?"
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
That flicker seems to put Akane off guard for just a moment -- no, more than that, it sends her reeling a little. She almost flinches from it -- no one but Nanai would probably even have the chance to notice her having such a feeling. But it's there.
The net effect is that she draws into herself a bit. "... I don't like talking about it much," she says, when she's asked 'from where.' "I've moved around a lot. This is the first time I've been anywhere for more than a year in a while. ... Uh, I'm Japanese, though! Don't let the hair fool you."
Akane leads Nanai along. "It's not super far to Ryuutei," she says. "Do you want anything? I already ate with my friends, but I can spring for something. I don't have to be eating to have a good time eating with someone."
She doesn't know much about here...? Well, Akane can give her the basics. "There's been a few kaiju attacks lately... plus there's this woman from your world's Chasseur who's..." Akane rubs at the back of her head, then tilts her chin just a bit down. "... this is gonna sound crazy, but sure, let's go for it. She's got something in her brain that makes her want to end the world. ... she shows up here sometimes 'cuz she wants to get coffee, I guess!"
And to loop it all back around, she concedes, "... so yeah, 'unusual' is about right, lately!"
<Pose Tracker> Nanai Miguel has posed.
Nanai sees the ripples move out from here and move through Akane. That reaction, that telling reaction: she has seen it before in so many women Akane's age. This is when it starts getting bad.
And so Nanai falls silent. She follows along and listens, letting the younger woman leap from topic to topic. Quiet observation suits her better these days. The downside is that Nanai has such an excellent poker face that it may seem like she's impressed with nothing. Attentive, at least.
Still, a few beats of silence suggest that she's considering Akane's words rather than merely waiting for her turn.
"It doesn't sound crazy," she says. "It's easier for things to get into a person's mind than most people would expect."
The rest, the question of food -- for a short time, it seems like Nanai isn't going to answer. She's deciding. Deciding whether to play along and have a pleasant meal, build a rapport, work quietly and subtly like the good doctor she should have been.
Or if she's going to seize the moment before mobile weapons decide the fate of a world again.
They're alone enough.
"Akane," she says, purposefully stopping to face the other woman. "Do you remember Junius Seven?"
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
The question catches Akane totally off-guard. It's so different from how everyone else has approached her -- there's been this sense that they wanted to treat her with kid gloves, with care. Being asked, so directly and so out-of-nowhere, about Junius Seven --
"Like -- the PLANT cities?" Akane asks, the curve of her eyes briefly widening and then flattening into a blink. "Sure I do. They founded it like 30 years ago, right? What's that got to do with anything?" For anyone else, that question would've been it -- her poker face is astounding.
But she can't hide the reaction of the monster in her heart. Like a nuclear torch, the abrupt mention startles it -- forces it into full retreat, for fear-of-pain. The kind of howl-shriek that levels buildings.
It doesn't show on her face at all, certainly not with the same reflex. She looks like any other teenager given a slightly weird prompt.
What, then, of the monster within her? Does she even know it's there...? It wouldn't be the first time a young woman's thoughts, feelings, memories -- all of them were a muddle, a swirl of truths and untruths.
"I... I'm not feeling super great, actually," Akane volunteers. It's more weakness than she likes admitting, but... "I think I might be coming down with a cold or something." She pulls out her phone again and checks it. ... definitely too early to get away with a curfew excuse.
<Pose Tracker> Nanai Miguel has posed.
Nanai knows this feeling well. The leaping-off point, when you're waiting to feel something underneath you again. Nanai waits, and plunges, and--
Like the PLANT cities?
No, like a DETONATION.
Nanai's own eyes widen and stay wide, the kind of moderated intensity displayed by someone in fierce control of their immense alertness. To these nothing-bodied passerbys, they're a confused teenager and an adult asking a serious question and expecting a serious answer. In another sense, they're thrashing beast and a woman raised on storm-wracked seas.
It wouldn't be the first time Nanai plunged stupidly into danger. The confidence with which she makes the decision bluffs that it won't be her last. She, after all, must do everything splendidly.
"It's alright," she says. She doesn't approach, but neither does she accept the retreat. "I know what it's like. Do you remember someone showing you this place? Someone who asked you if you wanted to stay here?"
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
How much does this woman know?
"I mean -- sure," Akane says, a little hesitantly. When it comes to lying with her *mouth*, she's not particularly great -- she can keep a story straight with considerable practice, but being on the spot is...
"Before I moved here, yeah. I was talking to someone online about the kind of place I'd want to live." Usually, Akane knows exactly how much she's giving away; *here*, she has no idea. Maybe if she were a little more aware -- a little more willing to be in congress with another human being -- she'd actually find it easier to hide.
With a shrug, she ultimately says, "It seems like it worked out though! I'm pretty happy here, overall. Spring break was nice."
Her brow furrows a bit. "You've got a lot of questions about here, though... is this really just about your friend? Are you thinking of hopping over more permanently, or something?"
<Pose Tracker> Nanai Miguel has posed.
In the silence that follows, Nanai never turns away.
It's a silence filled with Akane talking, but a silence all the same. That beast, that shadow, that self or that predator, is in a peculiar state of tension. A cornered psyche, like a cornered beast, is uniquely dangerous. Nanai listens to the answers while waiting for the answers.
There's no way to tell from Akane herself what she knows or doesn't know. The lie is too comprehensive, the context too lacking. If Nanai wasn't barging in to speak with a stranger, perhaps she could suss things out -- but here, now, all she has to go on is a plausible deniability pierced by a feeling.
These days, Nanai knows more about trusting those.
"It is about her," says Nanai. Her fingers curl into the fabric of her coat, laid neatly over the top of her shoulder bag. Be daring. Like him.
"But it's also about you. I think something happened to you, Akane. I think that sometimes when something terrible happens to someone with a sensitive mind, they can go somewhere to hide. But you're not hiding entirely, are you? You're still letting people in. Does a part of you want to come back?"
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Ugh. This woman is cutting right to the heart of it. It's here that Mesta Mesua prompts one of Akane's most genuine emotions -- one she hates letting herself feel where other people can see it.
Fear.
Kaworu presses her like this, too -- but he's a monster. It's easier to share with him. With Nanai, it's...
"... Is this one of those weird Newtype things?" she asks, brow furrowing. "Sorry," she says, rubbing at the back of her head. "I've got no idea about this stuff." It sounds like she knows a lot about this kind of thing, Akane realizes -- if ever there was a person to ask about the 'psychic rupture,' this would be her.
She can't let herself. She can tell that Nanai is already setting up in her head to imagine Akane like -- like one of those children that comes up when you read about Newtype research trials. ('Trials,' here, in the legal sense, of course.) Tortured and traumatized until their minds crack so far open that they slam their heads against the safety glass until something breaks. A footnote in some horrible person's sentencing document. A victim.
Akane refuses. That won't be her. She's no hero, no villain, and most importantly of *all* no victim; she knows that leaves only one role for her to take, and if that's the case, so be it.
Monster is easy. It requires no thought at all.
"I'm -- definitely coming down with something," she affirms, sounding a little too much like she's begging off for her own tastes but not able to stop herself. "Sorry -- I can't help you look around town. You should honestly probably get going."
She starts to physically retreat, now. Her feet backpedal before she knows what she's doing. She's not at a sprint, but the 'excusing herself' has begun to occur at speed.
<Pose Tracker> Nanai Miguel has posed.
No more quiet nodding. Just the attentiveness. The terrible fullness of being perceived. Every step backward that Akane takes, Nanai does not answer. She remains still, and yet the difficulty of leaving her has not abated.
Fear. It's the fear she feels that tells her to keep going. It's not the fear of someone meeting an odd lady. It's too much, too attuned, all echoing off that first guess. This is it. There is a shred of truth here upon which she may clutch.
"I came here from Junius Seven."
Even as Akane's backpedaling grows more sure, Nanai does not relent.
"That's one of two places people can arrive here from. The other is in Nouvelle Tokyo. Did you want to return to a happier place?"
The distance grows between them. Nanai raises her voice, her fingers digging deeper into her jacket.
"This warm world is for the people who are ready to pass beyond, Akane. Don't let someone convince you to leave the cold world before you're ready! Not even yourself! It hurts, but we have to bring the warmth to it!"
To whom does she speak with such familiarity?
Of course she knows it's herself. But it's all she has.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Strictly speaking -- none of this is anything Akane doesn't know. But hearing it all in sequence -- it's too much for her as she is now. Sure, she's been... improving -- she's been cautiously reaching out to more people, she's been helping try to free Renais -- but...
Any acknowledgment of this would be too much. Even the fear Nanai feels rolling off of her feels like too much to broadcast -- but Akane's *genuine* mastery of her emotions is almost nonexistent. "I -- I'm going," Akane stammers.
She turns. She moves with urgency now -- her own pain is already enough to fill her whole heart, in both its size and its texture. Hearing more -- and so similar -- makes her feel like she's going to burst.
A cold world's too much for her to handle. She wants that eternal summer just a little longer, yet. And if it burns her to a crisp... maybe that's better for everyone -- especially now that the people she cares about are leaving even this little slice of space.
<Pose Tracker> Nanai Miguel has posed.
And so Akane goes.
Nanai stays.
Nanai stays and watches, and feels the tension go out of her body, and her shoulders slump and her head dip forward.
There was definitely something there. Maybe she should have gone slow. It's less risky to go slow. But, if the reports are right, this place comes with too much risk of its own. Maybe...
"It took you time, too," comes a young voice.
The starry garment at the edge of her vision tells her what her heart already knows.
"I'm glad to see you again," says Nanai, her voice soft and quiet. She lifts her gaze to look over the diminutive, androgynous figure hidden in the darkness of its hooded cloak. "I don't know if I did the right thing."
"You chose this."
Nanai nods, momentarily mute. Her eyes cast down to the warm pavement. She can feel the heat coming up through the thin soles of her shoes.
Then, she says: "And now she needs to choose."
The figure floats in an unseen breeze. Then, they extend their slim hand.
"Do you wish to return?"
"Yes," says Nanai. She extends her hand. "Always."
She slips into the darkness of the stars, and when she opens her eyes again, she is elsewhere.