2023-05-08: Encroaching Exam ~BREAKDOWN~
- Log: 2023-05-08- Encroaching Exam ~BREAKDOWN~
- Cast: Akane Shinjo, Alouette Pommier
- Where: Orbit Base - Conference Room
- OOC - IC Date: 0097-05-08
- Summary: It turns out handling the exact number of things you can handle for as long as you can handle them doesn't work out great. Fortunately, Alouette's there to help Akane put herself back together.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
A helpful reminder GUTS text blast goes out to everyone who's volunteered their contact information.
Akane's working her way through the tail end of her improvement goals on yesterday's practicum work when it does, having commandeered an empty conference room for the purpose. Over the course of the next hour, her mood craters; she stops getting things done about 15 minutes in, then spends the next 45 minutes tearing through her bag, realizing she doesn't have her schoolwork other than printouts she made during today's remote classes, and promptly settles for...
... shoving everything off the table in frustration, putting her head down, and crying after letting out a half-wail, half-scream.
It's one of those days.
<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
Alouette.. doesn't have very much on the table today. The reminder of incoming exams didn't happen to spur much of a notable reaction out of her, either. She's simply focused on carrying out whatever must be done on Orbit Base.
...Which leads Alouette to the empty conference room that Akane took over, to check on how she's doing. She frowns when she hears sobbing noises from within, and fires off a quick VERTEX standing outside the door. "Mind if I come in?"
When given the okay, she helps put everything that fell off the table back where it should be, and takes a seat across from her junior. "...One of those days, I take it? Geez, that vacation you filed for really can't come sooner." She sighs, folding her hands together. "I'd gladly help you out with your schoolwork or operator work, but something tells me that's the last thing you want to keep on your mind. Why don't we start by packing all this up?"
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Akane takes about two minutes to respond to the VERTEX message; she glances up, taps out a, 'go for it,' and then returns to lying there even as Alouette heads in. She tries to force herself to stop looking miserable, but all that does is make her more miserable; she curls in on herself a little, remaining an undifferentiated mop of dark hair.
"There's too much," Akane mumbles into her sleeve -- then, after a moment, she tries again, sitting up enough to at least be audible instead of telling her woes to a bunch of cloth. "It's too hard! Studying in French sucks and having to juggle every stupid desk so I understand enough of what's going on to make good decisions instead of bad decisions at my desk sucks too."
Alouette suggests packing things up, though, and Akane... simultaneously starts going through the motions of doing it once Alouette gets things back onto the table and complains, "It's only gonna get worse when it's actually midterms..."
The mention of the vacation doesn't quite register for now.
<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
Alouette isn't actually wholly surprised to see Akane like this either, in fact, she thought it was inevitable the moment she started taking out the Intelligence and Research books, too. "You're right. Way too much." She remarks as she sweeps a book into the bag. "Some of these books I've never seen leave the shelves since I rejoined 3G, you know."
"There's a lot you need to juggle to work in Operations... it might deceptively be the most difficult desk. Emotionally, I mean." Alouette adds, looking downwards. "But you're still the junior operator.. you don't need to handle all of this by yourself. Even Miss Mikoto needed backup time and time again, you know."
Once everything starts being packed up and Akane continues to complain, Alouette shakes her head. "It doesn't have to be worse. We still have a good week or so, right?" She actually has to quickly check her phone to confirm that. "I think the best way to do this is to get used to studying in French first." Alouette suggests. "Even if you can't quite think in the language, maybe it's best to start by building an association in your head between the language and studying, right?" And well, presumably they're speaking the language to each other right now. "Otherwise it's just like putting a square peg in a round hole."
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Akane blinks as Alouette agrees with her assessment but in a totally different way. "I mean, you wouldn't, right? They're... Yamajii's and Kamuy's and Swan's stuff," Akane answers, without a hint of irony that if they're not Alouette's problem they're also not her problem, given they're at the same desk.
"Yeah," Akane says, forcing herself to at least hold a conversation. "I... talked to Rikka a little about that. It's... honestly, being out in the field's kinda easier. It's risky and it hurts, but..."
She trails off there for a little while. Right. One thing at a time. "That makes sense, yeah," she agrees. "It is pretty new for me, and I'm kinda in the deep end..." Akane's fingernails dig into her thigh as she says, "I still feel like I'm only okay in French..." Even though she talks to Alouette and Renais in it, it's still... even if she isn't clumsy, she feels clumsy.
<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
"Precisely." She nods, that it's not really her area to touch. "It helps to know the basics of Intelligence. After all, the Mobile Corps have to work closely with the Intelligence bots like Volfogg and Porc-Auto." Looking at Akane more directly, she adds, "This goes a little beyond what we would expect from cross-bloc operations, don't you think?"
Alouette can't help but understand what Akane means by finding deploying on-field easier. "Mm.. it's weird, but I find doing both easier. It's why I have Guardienne Aviaire, being on the field makes it easier to coordinate things. It helps that I can handle myself in a fight, too." She smiles. "It's a little funny to hear you say that after you said you thought I was doing better off the field."
When Akane says she's been thrown into the deep end, she's not kidding. Alouette scans the print-outs Akane had, left and right. "Wow, some of these words, I wouldn't expect a beginner to know at all. It's kind of impressive that you're able to remember them anyways. They say conversation is the best way to learn, so let's just keep it up." There's a little grin.
"Come to think, how have things been at the Mass Villa? I know it's been rough... has everyone been holding up okay?" It's not an easy conversation topic, but it is a conversation topic. "Renais has mostly been telling me about the cats, so at least I know they're doing just fine."
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Akane considers bringing something up in response to 'the basics,' but while she's stacking up her books, she decides to let it go. Shoving things into her bag, she agrees, "... yeah, it is a little much. I can probably drop Research and Engineering, at least, like... those are mostly different. Some of what I learned there has come in handy, but..."
The other part -- catches her totally off guard. "Ahaha, I. guess I did say that. didn't I." Expression straining a bit, she concedes, "Yeah, I, uh -- I was sure wrong on that one. Wow. No, uh, yeah, like -- being able to identify stuff going on just makes me want to do something about it instead of waiting around..."
When Alouette praises her French, Akane says, "I mean -- we have been talking in it for like a year? I don't feel like a beginner." ... That, itself, catches her off guard to actually say. The enthusiasm does a little to buoy her mood, though... she's still pretty fragile.
The question of the Mass Villa gets complicated fast. "It's... kinda been a lot, actually. Sayla's been recovering from whatever happened with Char, and like -- I'm fine? But..." ... well, she's mentioned this somewhat before, but...
"I've managed to clear everyone in 3G when it comes to being tied up with the Banshee, which means it's pretty much either my ex-classmates or someone I live with." That's enough to get her to stop packing up and slump back into her seat and put her head down again. "I can't... it's still going on and there's still... whatever's happening, it's..." A ragged breath comes out. "I feel like at this point I've cleared basically everyone, so -- ugh. I'm missing something and I'm just -- wrong about it, and --"
<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
"Mmhm. I work with research myself pretty often... but what I do is a pretty different niche from what Doctor Sai does." Alouette nods. "Neuronoid-related studies only really became part of 3G's mandate between the time I lost my memory and came back. It's not something we have to concern ourselves with too much unless it involves the well-being of GaoGaiGo's pilots." And the Algernon side of things... she'd rather leave that to Hinoki, too. Ingredient Synthesizer #26 was a BAD experience.
"Ahaha, right? Operating in a fight is really stressful, too. I think the worst part has to be working with the Dividing Driver's time limit." Remembering the last time it was deployed, she adds, "We cut it too close against Char."
"I guess it has been a year," Alouette replies. "It really doesn't feel so long? You're definitely past the intermediate stage then."
Alouette nods in understanding when Akane mentions Sayla's still recovering. "I can imagine. I watched her get taken away first hand. And her secret's out, too." Sayla's already trusted Alouette with a lot, so she'll have to pay that back by visiting when she can.
The Banshee also gets a noticeable frown out of Alouette. "...I wish we knew more, but Alexis must be the type to give just little enough information to get us to struggle with it." She considers. "It must sound really uncharacteristic of me to say this... but I wonder if we'll only ever get an answer if we force it out of the Banshee itself." The hard part being of course, getting close enough to extract the pilot without getting a point blank psychic attack or beam magnum.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Akane doesn't quite pull herself out of her spiral, but conversing is an improvement. "mhm. I could, but..." ... Akane considers finishing that sentence, and then doesn't. She's thinking about it, but... maybe that one can go unexpressed. "I didn't realize that stuff was that recent... I guess I could have figured that out from the documentation, but everything's really well put together."
Her French proficiency... actually does make her a little happier. It's nice to be recognized as good at something, even if it instantly makes Akane suspicious that Alouette's talking her up solely to get her to shut up. ... well, even if that were true, it wouldn't be something she could broach readily.
"... You're probably right," Akane agrees. "I had an idea for a Tool, or maybe a combination of Tools, but... I can't quite make it add up. We don't have great options for getting people out right now..." She turns that over in her head a bit. "... this is another one of those stupid 'the answer is for us to work together on it' things, isn't it," comes a half-groaned answer.
<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
Alouette considers poking Akane on what she was going to say, but ultimately she lets it linger. "That technology came with the merger with Akamatsu Industries. And.. they needed some sort of baseline for the newest King of Braves." She pauses for a moment. "This whole time, they had the Prototype PhantomGao just lying around... I guess they couldn't do anything with it without me around anymore." Now it's changed hands to Akane... interesting how that works.
Truthfully, Alouette is just happy to have someone else to converse in the language, if that counts for ulterior motives. Other than her mother and Renais, there's not many other people she's close to and speaks to in French on a regular basis. She works with Japanese a lot more frequently.
"Right. There's Hell and Heaven, but it's not easy to just... use, right? That's the whole reason they invented the G-Tool. I never really breached the subject with Guy, but I think he's nervous about dusting it off without Goldymarg with us." That prototype has been sitting there for a looooong time. "I take it you have a solution in mind? And yes - it'll definitely be a joint effort between Operations, Research and Maintenance."
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
"Sometimes stuff's just waiting for you to pull it back out of the trash, I guess," Akane says, and there's something reassuring about saying it. It doesn't actually address anything, but it does at least remind Akane that things can be addressed.
"Yeah, Guy and I were talking about that too," Akane agrees. "And I... kind of do, but --" Oh. Right. There's a solution to that. "... I'll send you the like three things I have on it after I clean them up a bit? They're just phone doodles... this isn't really... my thing? I got used to doing that with kaiju, though..."
... something half-clicks. It doesn't click all the way into place, but -- "Huh. In the end, this is the same kinda deal as fighting Gridman, huh..." Her feelings on it seem pretty mixed. "But yeah -- I have like... half an idea. I don't think it'd work for Zonder Robos, but it might work for mobile suits and mobile armors... I'm trying to get it to a place where it'd work on everything but there's some real hurdles there."
Letting out a ragged breath, she admits, "... god, what if I bomb my first 'real' high school exams?" It's a distressing thought. Even if there's a lot of mitigating circumstances, it still feels like a referendum on her...
<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
"Mmm. I definitely felt like that little one was waiting for me," she agrees. It is nice to hear it.
"Sounds good," she nods about the phone doodles. "We'll just have to see if we can work with it."
Alouette's able to piece together what Akane means, just a little bit. "It's not really different from when I made weapons for BioNet, either." She admits. "I can separate it in my head a bit, though. Being a designer isn't exactly a crime. I feel like it depends on the purpose."
"With cases like the Banshee and all those Ruin Apostles using enhanced MS's, it would help to have some more efficient anti-mobile suit tactics. It's a start, for sure."
"Are they particularly harsh over at Monserrat?" Alouette ponders. "I feel like even if you do bomb, most schools would give a transfer the opportunity to make it up." A beat. "Not that I think you'll fail or anything..."
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
... oh, that would be true for Alouette, too, wouldn't it... Akane feels the gears of her brain grind to a halt a bit as she gets to that. On the one hand, it's nice to have the shared experience; on the other hand, she doesn't really want to drag Alouette back to that experience, either...
She nods, ultimately, committing to -- "I'll have the idea for you at least, and a couple of rough sketches. If I'm feeling really ambitious, I might try a physical mockup... as much as I've been drawing lately I kinda prefer that." Who knows if she'll find it manageable, but it's worth trying!
Akane takes several long, deep breaths, trying to stabilize herself before the other question. She's... more of the way there, at least. "You're probably right, but -- how do I even ask for that? It was one thing when I could be totally sure Sayla'd be fine, but after what happened with Char I feel like I can't ask her to fight the school over it if it comes to that." A long sigh. "Ssssssssucks."
<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
"Excellent, I'll see about forwarding it to the Engineering and Research teams for you too." She subtly takes the load for that off of Akane there. "A physical mockup would probably be helpful, but don't push yourself to do it, either.
"I'd be surprised if they weren't a little more lenient since you're working for 3G, too. That's how it works for me over at Jindai. Although they might just be more accomodating in general because there's a surprising amount of pilot students..."
Sensing that even if she's helped her part of the way, it might be difficult to fully pull Akane out of that particular spiral on her own, Alouette changes the subject. "You know, I was able to obtain a copy of that Taraba game you were telling me about.. it's just been sitting on my shelf for a while, though. Since you're here, I could probably use your expert opinion on one of the stages, if you're up to it?" She offers, a hint of enthusiasm in her voice.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Alouette's probably smart enough to either turn a bad mockup into something good or turn a good one into something actionable, Akane reflects, so... "Yeah, okay. Once we pack up here I'll get it together." She finally gets back to it, shoving the last of her things into her bag.
... the offramp is a big win. "Ooh -- yeah, I could do that." She's got a feeling she knows which one Alouette's talking about, too. "I'm still really interested to see how X4 works if you play the game first -- it's actually the bigger version..."
Even if Akane's still nervous about midterms and feels like this might be too much distraction... maybe she'll feel better if she just lets it work out. There's worse things she could do than spending time with a friend.