2022-10-27: Overlooking
- Log: 2022-10-27- Overlooking
- Cast: Kaworu Nagisa, Akane Shinjo
- Where: Tsutsujidai - Construction Site
- OOC - IC Date: 0096-10-27
- Summary: Two monsters talk about allies and enemies.
<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.
Summer is eternal in Tsutsujidai. Even at night, when the city twinkles with little lights, it's still warm. But temperature means nothing to Kaworu, who can survive comfortably in the void of space. If he wears a dark blue hoodie on this balmy evening as he perches on the edge of rib case-like steel beams and strong gusts savage his hair, then one will have to pardon his aesthetic.
From where he stands, hands tucked into his hoodie pockets, he watches those twinkling lights, blinking like fireflies throughout the portions of the city past the chain link fences that are not under construction. One can't really call them 'completed,' after all, since Tsutsujidai is in a perpetual state of edit mode. It's beautiful, in its own way, but it makes the hollow stagnation of this abandoned construction site that much more apparent.
Even so, he smiles and hums to himself. Beethoven's 9th, otherwise known as Ode to Joy--as if this place is one of joy.
Far above, on the other side of the PLANT, a cloud shimmers with iridescent colors. But that's another story.
He isn't the only one here. But he's comfortable simply being, right now. This is a place that allows that for him, and whatever else happens, he's grateful for that. He's grateful to its creator for letting it be a place like that for him. Perhaps that's why he hums that song--
--while he knows perfectly well she's in earshot.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
As so often happens lately, Akane Shinjo has crawled up to the top of the crane and situated herself on the platform. She doesn't have much choice in locations; she could try one of the sluice gates or a couple of high-rises, but those tend to attract more people. Solitude is just as important as height, here.
Swipe... swipe...
... She hears that song approaching. Well. Best to put such things aside for now.
She peeks over the side of the platform, making sure it's who she thinks it is -- but that's a very distinct hum. "Huh. Wasn't expecting you here," she says, brow furrowing a little bit. "I kinda figured after you showed up at the mall you wouldn't wanna spend as much time here."
On the one hand, he can absolutely suit himself; on the other, Akane doesn't have the appetite for what she was planning with an observer. Those are always -- difficult, intimate tasks. She'll wait.
<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.
The crane platform overlooks the entirety of the construction site, and so it overlooks where Kaworu stands too. He minds this not at all, tilting his head back as if peering up a shaft and smiling up at Akane.
"Why?" he wonders. As if it's truly opaque to him that she might think that.
It's a little disingenuous. Their last two encounters--at the audience hall at Tsutsujidai High, and before that, at the mall as she mentions--weren't wholly friendly. Still, right now, he's at ease.
If nothing else, it doesn't seem like he's about to chastise her about what's going on with her 'guests.' The vibe is more like what they used to have before the Chaos Bringer effect broke in... though it's not completely the same, either.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
'Why?' is always a little difficult; Akane struggles with it as she repositions, sitting down with her legs crossed and looking more fully down at Kaworu. (This is kind of an awkward angle for having a conversation, and just a little too much distance.)
It takes her a long time to come up with an answer -- which means Kaworu has time to approach or retreat as he will. Eventually, she settles for, "I kinda figured you'd have to prioritize your NERV duties." It's kind of a half-truth -- what she actually means is something just a little more cynical, a little worse -- but she doesn't want to introduce that into the conversation herself if Kaworu isn't going to.
She shifts from side to side a little bit, trying to get comfortable on her perch. ... it's not likely to actually work out like that, but she can try!
<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.
For the first few moments, Kaworu remains where he is. However, when Akane gives her answer, his expression turns thoughtful... and a little melancholy. It shifts towards the night sky, past the stars to that glimmering cloud.
He sort of picks up on her true meaning, but he also sort of doesn't. All he knows is that it's probably not quite what she really feels. After all, his NERV duties would mean he'd need to spend more time here.
So, without bending his knees, he springs high into the dark air. There, he turns gracefully in slow motion and descends feather-light onto the platform, right behind Akane. This might alarm her at first, but once there, he simply... leans back onto her, back-to-back, very gently. It would be easy for her to push him off or away.
"Why actually?" he wonders, tone low and soft as he gazes upwards.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
After a few moments of considering whether to get up and leave outright, Akane settles in exactly where she is, shifting to lean back against Kaworu a little. (It's fine, she tells herself; the physical contact will put him off his guard, a bit.)
"... I guess I'm kinda surprised you'd hang out with me at all, if you know what I'm doing. It's not like you're Alouette's buddies; Ikumi seems like he's scared to make a move, and Mamoru... kinda seems like an idiot. But you... you get what's up and --"
... Akane cuts herself off. She feels more open in a conversation where she doesn't have to look at the other person -- no, has no expectation whatsoever that she'd even try. That's kind of the problem, though.
She switches tracks. "Shinji and I had a conversation the other day. I gave him a little more than I expected. ... I think he's pretty stuck on you. Or at least on someone. He didn't bite at all when I started doing the foot thing."
<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.
Kaworu waits for Akane. When at last she settles in and leans back, his smile grows a little more.
He listens too to her response. "And?" he prompts--but instead, she changes the topic to Shinji. Kaworu doesn't have a problem with that, though his smile turns a bit pained as Akane describes him as 'stuck on someone.'
"He has eyes for the Second Child, Asuka Shikinami Langley," he replies quietly. "Just before you swayed her to come here, they had gone on their first date." Shinji believes it went poorly, but it was the first step in a new direction for their relationship, and any relationship with Asuka is going to be contentious to start.
"Why do you do the 'foot thing'?" he adds, wondering. "Yuta mentioned you've done it to him, too." (And of course, she did it to Kaworu when they first met--though only that one time.) "I don't really understand the purpose of it."
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
As much as facing away from Kaworu relieves her of the burden of needing to keep up the performance, it also makes it difficult for Akane to read him. She loses so many cues that way. Her gaze turns down, then, instead. She leaves the 'and' unanswered -- she doesn't want to give voice to that, so she won't.
"Hmmm..." Akane considers that. She's not sure she agrees -- sure, Shinji was part of the range of dreams she inserted herself into, but... there was someone else, too, and that connection felt -- different to her. Then again, she's not sure she really gets how anyone connects to anyone, so... if Kaworu says it, she won't challenge it for now.
"I mean, what's a body like this for if not using it to your advantage?" she counter-asks, at the question of why she does the foot thing. "That's how things work everywhere. If you've got something nice to offer, a lot of conversations get easier."
<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.
Even if Akane had brought up that there was someone else there, Kaworu would only assume that it was Rei Ayanami instead--or perhaps Misato Katsuragi. He has resigned himself for some time to the fact that he is not first in Shinji's heart, however much he wishes he were.
It's a good thing. Loving one person so much is wonderful, but also very lonely at times. Kaworu just wants him to be happy. If Shinji's happiness is in other people, so be it.
"'A body like this'?" he echoes. It's clear from his puzzled tone that he doesn't really get her meaning there. Still, he does get her meaning overall. It's true that many aspects of Lilim society are transactional. Not even in a bad way, as that might sound; it's simply common sense to Lilim that if someone offers you something nice, you offer something nice back.
It's one of the many ways in which Kaworu is not a Lilim. He doesn't need anything in return for what he freely gives.
"Then you did that with me because you thought exploring my body with your foot would make the conversation easier?" he says instead. A beat. "How often does that work?"
It hadn't had an effect on him, apparently it hadn't had the intended effect on Shinji, and Yuta hadn't described it favorably either. But that's a sample size of only three. Surely it must have worked on someone at some point, or why would she keep doing it?
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
"I guess that's the kind of thinking you get when you've only ever looked the one way," Akane muses, when Kaworu asks. "I think the conversation was easier from the start. Doing that just emphasizes the difference." And there's a sense where that's not wrong, at least to her; certainly in middle school she never got that kind of reaction out of Shinji. Or really anyone.
Thinking about it, though, Akane gives Kaworu... her honest answer. They're both apart from humanity, in that sense -- he won't judge her for engaging it as an observer first and an actor second, she thinks. "It works all the time, and I don't just mean for me. You hear stuff! When I was little, people were pretty sure my mom got intimate with someone in the Britannian supply corps. I mean, how else would she have known when to move to Tokyo? You hear that kind of story all the time. People with nice bodies have it a lot easier than people without them."
She gets back to her personal experience, if only indirectly. "Humans are kinda shallow. I got totally different reactions as a first year than as a third year, and since I look like this now, it's way different. Doing that kinda stuff emphasizes it."
<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.
"I suppose so," Kaworu concedes. "I haven't ever looked any other way than this."
There have been times when he was bigger. But he still looked fundamentally like himself.
So it usually does work... Kaworu wonders what makes himself, Shinji, and Yuta different. If it were just him, the answer would be obvious, but what do the three of them have in common...? Still, when she describes it in broad terms, rather than something she specifically does, he does understand a little better.
"True. Aesthetically pleasing objects, such as a beautiful body, tend to garner a more positive response. Looking at beautiful things makes you feel good, so it's only natural to prefer that. I see... So you convert the aesthetics of your body into the intimacy of touch, and use that to provoke a positive reaction out of the other person."
It's certainly an analytical take. If Akane hadn't already figured that he wasn't straight, this would certainly clinch it. He considers this for a moment longer.
"I thought you didn't like touching strangers," he adds at length. "Though I suppose Yuta and Shinji aren't strangers to you, you and I had only just met when you did it to me."
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
"I guess that's... a way you could put it," she says. It's not the way she would, but she appreciates the high clarity involved in Kaworu's way of putting it. "I don't like touching strangers, but you don't have to like it for it to work," she says. "It's better for you if they like you, and it's better for them if they're getting something out of it. Whether you like the getting there doesn't matter!"
... It's kind of a depressing outlook on things. Akane sounds chirpy about it, but in a way that's distinct from excited; her own feelings about it are more than a little muddled.
"It kinda works worse on people you actually know, but then again, like, what else are you gonna do about it? Hibiki's my enemy, and Shinji... he's with NERV, too, right? He's a pilot. So that kind of makes him my enemy too." She looks out toward the city. "If you want to make someone who's your enemy not your enemy, you have to offer them something better than they're already getting."
<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.
"Yes, it is," Kaworu replies. Specifically, it's the way he put it.
It is a depressing outlook, though. His smile fades when she chirpily explains that it doesn't matter if she likes it or not; what matters is that it's effective. "...I see," he says.
And in a way, he really does. He sees why Akane is so deeply unhappy all the time now. Her way of perceiving the world and her place in it itself is fundamentally skewed towards making her unhappy. Is this why Alexis approached her...?
His smile doesn't come back as she continues. To make someone who's your enemy not your enemy... Renais had told him that Akane has been primed to see those around her as enemies so that she would be loathe to accept their help. And she describes Shinji as a pilot of NERV, and therefore definitionally her enemy. Kaworu is fairly certain he knows the answer, but he wants to be completely certain.
So:
"Do you consider me your enemy, Akane?"
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
The question gets Akane fully off-guard. Kaworu can feel her body tense up. The back-to-back contact makes it more difficult to mask that kind of reaction with her hoodie; he can feel it.
"Right now? Obviously. You keep opposing my kaiju. Isn't that what an enemy is?" She shakes her head, saying, "Like -- I know you're going to say you want to help me or whatever but I really don't think it works that way. 'Enemy' and 'ally' is pretty straightforward."
Turning that thought over in her head, she continues, "Besides -- you don't like what I'm doing right now. That was kinda obvious at the mall, and it was even more obvious at school! You don't need to hate someone for them to be your enemy. You can even like them. Feelings don't matter one way or another once a kaiju's involved."
<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.
Kaworu does feel it, and he knows what her answer will be before she says it. But he doesn't know the way she will say it.
"I see," he repeats, and this time he sounds sad. Yet... as she goes on, while he doesn't stop being sad, he does grow more thoughtful.
"It's true I don't like what you're doing right now. But I still consider you a friend." He pauses. She said that you don't need to hate someone--that you can even like them--to be their enemy. He's very familiar with that concept. It was his foundational relationship for a very long time. But just as he needed to make complete certain before, so he asks now:
"Do you consider me a friend, too?"
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
The question continues to put Akane on the spot; the directness of it makes her anxious. Her gaze stays fixed outward; it's best if they don't look at each other.
"... Do kaiju have friends? What does that even mean?" She needs a little time to chew on it -- it's not easy the way the first question was. "I think..." Her expression flattens a little, as does her tone.
"If you mean do I like spending time with you, sure. But I don't think we can be friends the way humans can. And bad guys definitely don't have friends. So I guess... we're some kind of different thing." She doesn't sound pleased to say that, either.
She's silent for a while, chewing on that. She's still the villain here, right? She certainly has... well, no. They're not victims. NERV feels that way, but -- this is the way things should be. She's taking care of them. It's...
... what even is this?
Akane finds she no longer knows.
So what she has to say, instead, is: "I don't know."
<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.
Do kaiju have friends?
"Yes," Kaworu replies, decisive and unhesitating. The surety in his voice is nearly palpable, as solid as bedrock. He doesn't explain why he feels that way. To him, it's enough to convey that he does.
She also asks what it means to be 'friends.' She comes to her own conclusion on that--someone one enjoys being around--and that is certainly a 'friend,' so Kaworu doesn't contradict her. But she doesn't stop there.
I don't think we can be friends the way humans can.
"Why can't we?"
Bad guys definitely don't have friends.
"Why not?"
His questions are spoken gently. But they're still pressing, and they're still relentless. "Are you a 'bad guy,' Akane?" he continues. And: "Do you see me as a 'bad guy'?" And: "What makes someone a 'bad guy'?"
When at last Akane admits she doesn't know, Kaworu hums quietly, gaze rising to the heavens. The slight gesture smooths his back flatter into hers. "Even if we are something different from friends, I don't think that fundamentally changes the nature our relationship," he muses. "I still like you, and I like being around you. If you like being around me too as you say, then that's enough. It doesn't need to be any more complicated than that."
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Akane doesn't quite have the words to answer Kaworu's questions yet. Rather, she does -- but that requires acknowledging an uncomfortable truth about herself. It's funny that it's so difficult -- but it would require her to fully inhabit one of the unstated premises of her relationship with Kaworu, which seems particularly painful right now, with him right... behind her.
"I don't know the answers to all your questions. But... yeah, I guess so. Whatever it is is fine." She still shifts a little uneasily. Kaworu is always so nice, and it's... it feels undeserved. Like eventually that kindness will make her confront the world -- big and cold and vast. The colder world she's made her enemy.
It's now that it occurs to her that this is the same position she was in with Asuka, in their dream; that realization startles her -- enough to change topics, even. "Do you want your friends to leave here?" She doesn't sound like she counts herself in that number, the way she's saying it. "Just curious."
<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.
Kaworu can ask as many questions as he likes, but he can't make Akane answer. Perhaps it will be enough to make her think about it, even if it's not right here and now.
"I'm glad to hear it. I don't mind being enemies, if we can still also be friends," he replies, and while she may still be uneasy, he continues to be relaxed. The reason why may become apparent when he adds, "That was the relationship I had with someone very dear to me for a very long time."
Does he want his friends to leave here, though?
"I want all of you to be able to act according to your uncoerced will," he replies, gazing at the twinkling lights in the distance. "Whether you choose to leave or choose to stay doesn't matter to me. Not so long as you are the ones to choose."
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
The answer Kaworu gives is the hardest one of all -- and Akane's not so stupid as to miss the implication, either. Where before she would have defended herself more viciously, now she just doesn't have it in her; at this stage, she's teetering on the edge of so many realizations -- and terrified of actually having them.
So she elects not to. "I think this is about as 'uncoerced' as any choice gets," she says -- before starting to stand. It's an awkward movement; she has to turn herself sideways to avoid pushing Kaworu away, then start standing.
Then she does the awkward work of getting down from the crane. She's trying to avoid falling right now, after all. "Well... I can't stop you from hanging out, I guess," she says, as she makes her way away. "I have some homework to do now that exams are over. Seeya!"
It's really anything difficult that gets her to retreat, isn't it...
<Pose Tracker> Kaworu Nagisa has posed.
"Is it?" Kaworu wonders. And: "Can't you?"
But he doesn't stop her from leaving. After all, that is her uncoerced choice. "Yes," he thus replies. "Until we meet again."
He'll make his own way down the crane. But unlike Akane, he has no fear of falling. He hops lightly over the edge and lands with a softness that defies even the physics of Tsutsujidai's now-reduced physics.
That isn't anything she didn't already know about him, though. None of it is.