2022-05-29: The eye of my storm is not your shelter!
- Log: The eye of my storm is not your shelter!
- Cast: Yuliana Dispersal, Mitsuba Greyvalley
- Where: Alordesh
- Date: 2022-05-29
- Summary: Yuliana tests out her recovery on Mitsuba. Mitsuba is fine with it. Yuliana is not fine with it, but she's a pretty good actress.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Dispersal has posed.
After four days of recovery, Yuliana Dispersal is absolutely feeling the need to stretch her legs a bit. As something of a globetrotter, 'stretching her legs a bit' has a wide definition, but she's staying relatively close to home for this outing -- just heading from Sri Lanka over to Alordesh.
Lovely place. Great rice. Suggestible people!
Right now she's settled into a pilot's lounge popular with Federation types; while it's a hip and happening area, no one seems to be that eager to fight her for her booth. There's booze, of course, but she's sipping lemonade alongside her spongy milkish cham cham -- a popular sweet which just happens to come from around here. She has a plate of it, obviously. Yuliana Dispersal is voracious.
She's also positively normal, compared to a few days ago.
<Pose Tracker> Mitsuba Greyvalley has posed.
Mitsuba, as it happens, is also here. While the Dreisstrager intervening in small-scale unrest is, frankly, an allocation singularly beneath its station, its mere presence -- being a single ship that takes up nearly a sixth of the area of some of the country's major metropolitan area -- does a lot to make everyone chill out.
Sure, Mitsuba considers this a pointless cruelty on G-Hound's part to even suggest she pop her way into the area -- but this, too, serves peace and freedom in our world, one supposes.
Mitsuba herself isn't on the ship; this is partially a rest stop, after all. Part of her is already planning her next maneuver. Her gut tells her she should go southwest. It's not a fully rational urge -- though she can easily justify it to herself. There's a lot of border gore between the REA and the OCU around here, and Cambodia is even a --
She steps into the lounge.
She feels a little small, again. Adjusting her uniform, Mitsuba looks for a table -- and eventually finds Yuliana, neatly ensconced in her booth. The party never did provide a chance for them to say hello, properly.
"Excuse me -- do you mind?" Mitsuba asks, her expression a little tentative. "I passed you at the REA's infrastructure event briefly, but didn't get the chance to properly say hello."
... ugh, there's too much going on. She's lost track of the threads again. Best to just let them go and take a seat.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Dispersal has posed.
There are, frankly, bigger hollows hanging out here today; there are generally a few Newtypes, witting or otherwise, in a pilot's bar. The carved-out gash where information tries and fails to connect with her mind is so, SO obvious, to her. Yuliana is batting around the idea of nibbling on someone, but she assured Elisa she'd be ever so careful with herself starting out. It could make a scene...
Ah! But here, Mitsuba steps into the stage, and Yuliana smiles, welcoming. "Mm?" A bit of a light snack, to be honest; Yuliana wouldn't normally bother, given people with that faint a signature don't even always notice anything's amiss. Still, there's something about her...
"Oh!" Yuliana realises, as Mitsuba mentions just where she saw her. "Yes, yes, I remember!" She was the one who looked so dismal even just passing by. Delightful!
Well -- she can hardly be said to be exerting herself if Mitsuba comes to her.
"Please, sit," she gestures, to the booth, which -- tragically, is entirely within her sphere of influence. (So is the row of seats behind her. No one is sitting there.) She gestures, with a cham cham held delicately between her fingers. "Captain Mitsuba Greyvalley, of the Dreisstrager, if I'm not mistaken? Yuliana Dispersal -- REA special operations. Captain," she adds, casually. "Though I'm not on duty right now, of course. Here, would you like some?" She nudges the plate over, with her other hand.
The cham cham is not poisoned. Why would she poison her own food?
<Pose Tracker> Mitsuba Greyvalley has posed.
This is certainly not the worst invitation Mitsuba's received. She takes a seat, and seems... less put off, than the first time she walked past Yuliana. There's still that momentary wilt, that little bit of 'wait, what?' as she takes a seat, but she doesn't immediately crumple to profound weakness. Indeed, once she gets situated, she seems positively okay.
Mitsuba has never had cham cham before, but she's feeling a little adventurous; she takes one and eats it, experimentally. "Oh -- these are good," she says, eyes brightening just a bit.
"You know, I'd actually meant to strike up a conversation with you and not just your troops," she offers, conversationally. "I was out of sorts all night, though... in the long run I felt a little refreshed, but something kind of took the wind out of me once the mingling started."
Her expression sours a little as she admits, "I actually started wondering if I'd forgotten my medication, but that wasn't it... some nights are just off, I suppose."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Dispersal has posed.
What an interesting reaction!
"They rather are, aren't they?" Yuliana asks, popping hers into her mouth. "Wonderfully light and spongy! It's a speciality of the area -- they make them from milk, and dust them with dried milk to boot. And coconut, in this case!"
There's also a lot of curdling involved, but since people can get a little finicky about that process, Yuliana helpfully neglects to mention it. She also helpfully translates the local terms. She's so kind.
"Yes, come to think of it, my lieutenants mentioned you seemed under the weather," she reflects, having -- honestly forgotten they said anything, she's had a lot going on, don't worry about it. "But you seem far more sprightly here and now! You've remembered your medication today, I hope?"
Yuliana takes a sip of lemonade, which is not, exactly, a confirmation of anything, but is perhaps a little suspicious in context.
"But in the long run you felt refreshed, you say," she presses, as she puts the glass down. (There's no straw, obviously.) "How strange! I've never encountered a dismal mood which ended up being helpful before." Her interest is perfectly conversational; she can thank the pills in her pocket, for that.
<Pose Tracker> Mitsuba Greyvalley has posed.
"Oh, interesting! Now that you mention it, I can taste the milkiness, a bit. The coconut... if there were a little more of it it might be a turn-off, but here the texture is actually pleasant..." She decides that she's probably going to have to look this recipe up when she gets back to the ship; Reynold can probably make them, she thinks.
"I have," Mitsuba affirms -- though after a moment she thinks to check her portable device. "... Still a little early, yet," she says, putting it back away. (Evening dose, one per day.)
"It's a little strange, I agree," comes her next comment to Yuliana. "But I can't think of any other way to describe it. My technical officer and my XO insist I spend a little too much time on the ship, though -- it might just be that I'm not getting out enough."
REA special operations, with enough time to lounge... Mitsuba momentarily thinks back to the discussions she's had with Sophia Castellan. Then again, Yuliana seems pleasant enough -- maybe she's simply well-salaried for the job she does.
"How has Alordesh treated you?" she asks. "I'm a little surprised to see an REA operative here -- though not in a bad way." ... it does raise a few questions, but Mitsuba doesn't have the subtlety to ask them.
She seems fairly steady -- unlike at the party, where she'd wilted, here her reaction to Yuliana is so singularly unremarkable. She converses, chats, the way anyone else might!
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Dispersal has posed.
Tragically, the chef on Yuliana's team is an absolutely abysmal baker. Parminder does some incredible things with rice, though, so that's fine.
Yuliana inclines her head, as Mitsuba checks her screen. She gets it!
"Oh, you simply can't marry your job," she advises, loosely, on the subject of not getting out enough. "The military has no regard for equitable division of labour! Ahh, but I suppose I'm one to talk," Yuliana adds, with a rueful smile, lifting a hand in a loose gesture. "Congratulations on emerging from your chrysalis, in any case!"
Being fair: Yuliana is well paid. There is no one else on Earth who could do what she does.
"But please, please, it's nothing untoward," she assures Mitsuba, knowing that she knows about the rumours of her type, as she reaches over to pluck another cham cham between her fingers. "I just happen to be a neighbour! I'm based out of Sri Lanka, you see," Yuliana explains, popping the sweet treat into her mouth. This is, of course, public information, but it sounds like something she's giving her, and the impression is what matters. "I'm on a little vacation, and the food here is delightful."
It is interesting, the way she's holding up -- might be taking a while, she supposes. It would hardly do to show her hand this early in the game.
<Pose Tracker> Mitsuba Greyvalley has posed.
With a slightly tired smile, Mitsuba says, "You aren't the first one to tell me that, but... I feel like I have a duty to change things for the better, and the sooner is often the better. There's been some contracting nightmare for a plan I've been working on that's had everything backed up for weeks, and it's starting to make me antsy..."
Mitsuba remains at stride, though, even though she occasionally seems a bit tired. "Oh -- that makes sense," she agrees, on the topic of being based out of Sri Lanka and simply on vacation. "I can see why you'd pick this place -- the OCU has invested a lot in it, lately, and that does face the public in meaningful ways."
... She wishes, a bit, that it didn't feel like the populace was getting rewarded for leaning into anti-Coordinator sentiment. That's a bit of a rabbit hole, so she doesn't pick at it.
All at once, Mitsuba realizes she's... actually kind of become bad at sustaining casual conversation. Is she getting weird...? She has been at this a while -- and she's well-read enough to know the stories of other captains reaching that type of fatigue.
... May as well just own it. "If you're hoping for much in the way of gossip," she admits, "I don't quite have anything."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Dispersal has posed.
"Oh, that's true," Yuliana agrees, easily. "But one cannot be a force for equality in this world when pouring from an empty cup -- hmm, or perhaps I've muddled my metaphors a bit!" Well, given the way she sometimes talks, could anyone prove a slip like that wasn't intentional? "Still, what will come will come, and pacing about won't make it get here any quicker."
The best lies all have a little truth to them, of course. It would be easy to tell if Yuliana were blustering about ideals she didn't believe in. That she slips them in to ingratiate herself is hardly worth mentioning.
"You're quite right," Yuliana agrees. "Unfortunately, reconstruction in the Indian area is below par, in places..." And she does look discouraged about that; again, not entirely a lie. The details of why she finds the Republic's treatment of the region disappointing hardly need to be mentioned. "And while Sri Lanka's doing much better than India proper, well -- certain things flow on. Supply chains, and all," she gestures, with a vague 'you get it' sort of air.
"But are you feeling all right?" Yuliana asks, gesturing to Mitsuba with an open hand. "You look a little tired... is something weighing on you, perhaps?" A perfectly innocent question.
<Pose Tracker> Mitsuba Greyvalley has posed.
"... You really do sound like everyone else on the ship, now," Mitsuba says, with a smile and a brief laugh. "I always find it so easy to go around in circles... I can rely on someone else to pull me out of it, but I shouldn't have to make myself their responsibility. Quite the opposite, as Captain, actually."
She takes a deep breath in, and listens. "The REA is making the best of a tense situation, as it does," Mitsuba offers, on the topic of reconstruction in the Indian subcontinent. She can damn with faint implication, too, a little bit, if she tries.
Yuliana expresses concern about Mitsuba's state, and she concedes, "Quite the opposite. On the ship, I'm rarely tired, but I run myself in circles... here, I feel the opposite. It's almost nice, in a way -- at one point I was worried it was mania, but I asked my technical chief to check for biological signs of that and there's nothing." Maybe a touch of an overshare, but regardless, it's out there now. "I rarely let myself be tired, since we deployed."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Dispersal has posed.
"Quite so," Yuliana agrees, casually. "Now -- I don't command a ship like you, generally speaking, but it's my role as grand high overseer to make sure no one's taking on more than they can handle." Yuliana's opinion of what Cascade should be able to handle may not line up with Cascade's expectations, but this is not about that. "If I work myself to death, what will my men expect of themselves? Particularly given... military culture," she is quite deliberate about picking the word, leading Mitsuba to draw conclusions about the REA's culture without saying a word, "it's important to cultivate the correct workplace attitude, particularly if your specialists are too valuable to replace so easily."
Which would explain why she's on holiday. It's not just slacking off!
(This explanation is, of course, also wrong.)
"Hmm," she agrees, mildly, when Mitsuba supposese they're making do, as they do. Supposedly, she's humming because she's just popped a cham cham into her mouth. This is awfully convenient.
She rests an elbow on the table, casually, so she can rest her chin on the heel of her hand; her fingers bury in the hair which obscures half her face. (There's a scar, under there. That's hardly surprising. Spend long enough fighting, and anyone will get a few.) Yuliana nods, encouragingly, as Mitsuba divulges the differences between her life on the ship and out here.
"Perhaps it's the scenery," Yuliana posits, not believing for a moment that it's just the scenery. "If you're engaged every moment you're on your boat, why -- I'm sure you need a change of pace to let yourself relax at all! And as soon as that happens, well..." Her fingers fan out, by her face. "Don't you think that's a sensible conclusion? I'm sure you've gone on shore leave a few times before this."
<Pose Tracker> Mitsuba Greyvalley has posed.
Mitsuba nods -- command is command, whether you command a ship or just a squad. Like a spiral, the size grows but the shape remains the same as it gets bigger and bigger. "You know... I hadn't considered the idea that it's unfair of me to set such a grueling pace for myself, simply because it'll inspire overwork in others." She doesn't comment on the possibility of overworking-to-death.
Mitsuba gives a glance to that scar. She's heard tell that in some places, medical technology has advanced enough that that scar could be resolved in a day, and she's inclined to believe it... then again, perhaps the REA doesn't invest in such things. It'd suit her image of the bloc, certainly.
"Hmm -- I suppose so," Mitsuba agrees, when Yuliana offers the possibility that it's just a change of scenery. "Though it's never been quite as stark as it was at the party. A good meal and a change of scenery does bring out the best in me, but..."
Mitsuba takes a moment to inventory her behavior -- nothing seems particularly out of place, even as Yuliana begins talking her around. She knows there's nothing nefarious about any of this, but it's just... why is she unusually at-ease, here? She feels almost like she's back at the Academy.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Dispersal has posed.
Command is command, and they're talking captain to captain. Impressions are important. "Something to think about," Yuliana agrees, mildly, without pushing the point.
(It would suit her just fine if G-Hound were better at their jobs.)
REA Medical has more important things to tackle, with regards to Yuliana Dispersal and her scars. Anyway.
So it does change when she's out and about, Yuliana reflects. Something to do with the ship..? She wonders, all a sudden, just how Mitsuba would register to her lack-of-senses if she met her on the Dreisstrager.
Perhaps she'll have to visit, someday.
"Well -- it sounds like a whole mess of contradictions, but you seem perfectly well, weariness aside, so perhaps it really isn't so bad. Imagine that!" The best lies, again, have a little truth to them. Yuliana doesn't have to feign that surprise. "Perhaps you just needed a little peace and quiet."
Pilot lounges aren't exactly QUIET, but maybe she's being metaphorical.
<Pose Tracker> Mitsuba Greyvalley has posed.
Mitsuba takes a moment to ask, "... May I have another?" about the cham cham. She's not direly hungry, but she doesn't mind the idea of availing herself of a little more of this; it's honestly quite good and she really does want to try to get Reynold to make some once she gets back.
"Peace and quiet, in a place like this..." Mitsuba glances around. "You do have a more relaxed aura than a lot of other Federation officers, so that might not be far off the mark." It actually reminds her of her XO, a bit -- and honestly, the feeling is pleasant.
"I can't stay too long -- I mostly popped in to get off my feet for a minute. I'm not that familiar with the city, so I've been a little lost and needed somewhere friendly to take a little time for myself." She smiles at Yuliana, affirming, "This has been nice, though."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Dispersal has posed.
"Please do!" Yuliana says, nodding to the plate. "It would be a shame for me to eat it all with someone else right here." Her cham cham is Mitsuba's cham cham. She's quite generous.
She laughs, lightly, as Mitsuba calls her relaxed, and straightens up -- deliberately, as if she'd just been called on it. The word, of course, is 'self-assured', but Mitsuba doesn't need to know that. "I suppose I am a little loose," she agrees, goodnaturedly. "Plagued by a casual nature, so they say, but I like to think I do good work."
Which is a phrase which can be taken a few ways, really. She's interested to see which route Mitsuba takes.
She nods to her final point -- and raises her brow, at Mitsuba's final affirmation, before she smiles in turn. "Oh, I agree," she says. "It's been quite interesting to meet the indomitable Captain of the Dreisstrager personally." She wriggles her fingers, in a little wave. "Don't be a stranger, would you? Shore leave is for everyone."
Of course, she's entirely friendly.
She can't burn this bridge until she figures out
WHAT THIS WOMAN HAS DONE.