2022-12-15: To Properly Lie to Anybody Else
- Cutscene: To Properly Lie to Anybody Else
- Cast: Ennil El
- Where: Axis Colony
- Date: During the War - 0088
- Summary: A long quieted memory. Gentleness is its own cruelty. And Glemy Toto is a gentle young man.
Sizing the normal suit took some time. Ennil has only begun to grow into her height - and not gracefully, not in the way she will eventually inhabit it. Even dressed as a soldier, she struggles to look the part. The 'additional equipment' that she's been tasked with in this particular case isn't helping - even with her wild hair pulled back (softer and longer than it will ever be again in the next eight years - it spills to her shoulders and practically shines) there's a tension in her forehead she just can't shake, with the way it clings to her. But the machine itself...
God, the machine feels so good. Of course it does. Putting her hands on the controls only reminds her of countless hours before this with her hands under panels, or at terminals. It's not her very first time in the cockpit - individualized AMBAC adjustments involve a lot of adjustments on-the-fly while putting the suit through simple mobility courses, and that's easiest to do sitting in the pilot chair - but it is the first time she has inhabited it as a weapon. She beams up into the cockpit glass, and she does not see herself in a bad costume, in a place she does not belong. She simply sees herself happy.
The go-lights blink to life and she roars out of the hangar, electric. Everything behaves the way she wants it to. The way she knew it would. The final machine, of course, will be much finer than this. But you can test most systems in a refit Zaku just fine. Her heart shines, bright, warm, and she actually breaks into laughter as the first few targets swing up only to be sliced down in an almost reflexive crescent of beam fire. She tumbles through the void, jets clean of simulated return fire. She is weightless, only drawn to and fro by the movement. It's so simple. None of these machines can surprise her. She's studied and worked too hard, done too much to be good, to stumble over simple obstacles like this. She jets already towards the final objective, lifting a heat hawk --
Her right hand, pressed against the throttle, snaps free to clutch against her forehead. She feels pain in a way that is entirely new to her. Her left hand, trying to do the work of both, drags her off course - and her side lights up as well as the impact of the other mobile suit rocks her against her safety harness. It takes only moments for the Zaku's cameras to identify the intrusive presence - but the malice is already clear to Ennil. And well before she can seize the controls again, she understands the machine is too slow to save her from death.
There will be four more attempts today.
There will be four more failures. Four more agonies. A battlefield, even a simulated one, without distance or insulating silence...
Being good isn't good enough.
The palatial nature of Axis only makes her feel smaller. The pillar is, at least, tall enough to hide her slender form as she slumps into her knees. The psycommu lays on the floor of the simulator - the normal suit tossed aside not far after - and now she hugs a long skirt over her knees, fingers curling over the material and softly scraping textural noise from it to fill her head and chase away the cloud hanging inside her. Her vision is clouded - by tears, by loosely hanging bangs - and so the press of boots against the floor only becomes notable when it turns from the usual paths and approaches her.
She tugs at her hair desperately, trying to put it back in order, reaching a hand out for the pillar to support herself - and finding it clasped in another hand, instead. She peers up at handsome blue eyes and can't help but wince, pressing at her face with her sleeve in embarassment.
"...Glemy, sir..."
He just grins at her. "Now, that's wholly unnecessary. I've just never known you to miss your post, and it had been twenty minutes..." A little twist in his smile, his other hand already raised. "Don't apologize."
"...thank you, sir. Just -- it wasn't fair -- I know for a fact I could've --"
Glemy leans in, a little, and she takes his cue as he supports her to her feet, pressing a finger to his lips. "You're absolutely right, of course. It's not fair. And you understand why?"
She gazes into his blue eyes for a moment, and lets out a long sigh. "Yes, sir -- Glemy. The new equipment is for... Then that means, I -- I could absolutely do better! I could plead with Lady Haman and --"
The grip on her hand slides to her wrist. It's firm, but not painful. "You'll do no such thing. Those programs... You are not fit for them." The phrase scrapes against her, but his smile doesn't fade, and she fixes on that warmth. "They are for correcting failures. And you are very useful to me already."
Her heart lifts, but her shoulders sink. She presses herself back into the pillar, and the hand that slides up her arm to her shoulder... it's supportive, but so firm.
It creates a distance between them.
"...Of course, lord Glemy."
"You did very well today. The tests proved what I hoped they would. I'm sorry they upset you. Perhaps it was cruel not to tell you; You weren't meant to succeed. Can I expect you back at your post in, say, ten minutes?"
"...Of course, lord Glemy."
"I'm glad to hear that. Keep doing your best, Ennil El."
Of course.
It was never meant for her.