2023-07-09: Catch a Memory
- Cast: Seolla Schweizer, Jezebel Richens
- Where: Merida Island
- Date: U.C. 0097 07 09
- Summary: An acquaintance between a total newbie, and a merely semi-recent newbie! (Social link go!)
<Pose Tracker> Jezebel Richens has posed.
The F90 Gundam F90 is a damn strange machine in this hanger. It's not 'Mobile Suit' sized, as such - most MS ever made are substantially taller than it, with the head of the F90 peaking at around the mid chest of most of its ancestors. Of course, with the way the design was trending in the past five or so years, it's closer to the waist; that's about where it stands compared to something like the Nu. It's weird in this hanger because, while it stands taller than all the M9s and M6s pretty substantially, it does not truly tower over them, over twice their height, like every other Gundam would.
It's bigger, but not that much bigger. And, that's just standing. It's not standing right now; right now, it's kneeling, in a similar position as it was before, lower back exposed to get at the reactor, cold and silent. At this height - the F90 can see eye to eye with the M9s. Maybe it's more accurate to say they can see eye to eye to it, laid low like this. It's getting closer, though, to standing back up. Dozens of heavy cables attach to it, taking advantage of open parts of back, which they've peeled open to get into the reactor, and into the hardpoints on the backpack, the legs, the arms, the sides, the skirts - in all, there are a couple of dozen heavy wires attached to it, like it's in some strange, robotic hospital. Scaffolding climbs up to its back and attach securely to points on the armor.
The pilot - and, given how unknown the unit is to everyone but her, erstwhile 'lead engineer' - is taking a break. At this point, it isn't actually the armor damage that concerns her. If it just got beat up normally, she'd probably be good to go. Now, it's the water damage. ... Which, is a fake problem, if you actually prepare for it, and bring the water gear on the hardpoints, that is specifically designed for aquatic action. She can hear the voice of engineers not here complaining that she did something that silly. The reactor, at least, is working again. If that thing actually died, it probably would've been a real issue. Thing is just... tiny. Everything on it is so small.
Jezebel sips from a bottle of water, looking up at it, its guts spilled. She feels bad for it. All it took was treating it wrong, and it ended up like this.
<Pose Tracker> Seolla Schweizer has posed.
Exactly as predicted, Seolla got a earful from Dr. Goldberry as soon as she confessed to having smuggled away one last little stash of the School's higher-intensity combat drugs. Apologies were plentiful! Assurances that she'd never do that again were many! Promises that she didn't have any more of it were repeated!
After that scolding, though, a slightly rain cloud afflicted Seolla tiredly meanders her way to the Merida Island repair facility they're docked at for the time being, with very welcome relief and restoration in the wake of the everything that'd happened to the TDD recently. It being an island nation in the heat of summer, Seolla's breezily dressed in straightforward jean shorts and a pleated blue halter top, sipping away at a jumbo sized thermos. Obviously, the extremely unfamiliar Gundam half-disassembled is the point of interest here - especially given she remembers that one from when she'd got thankful backup against the Argent siblings. Seolla immediately runs up and belts out a stiff bow and a blurting "Thank you for helping me out back there, we're all super grateful for you-!" ...before the mechanic she is saying this too gently points her Jezebel's way.
...so now a more red-faced and slightly embarrassed Seolla is running up to Jezebel, bowing again, hands on knees. "...yeah, thank you...for bailing us out...! I barely...made it out of that alive, really. ...I'm Seolla! Seolla Schweizer. And those three you helped drive off are...people from the same facility I grew up in. ...I still wanna help them, but- ...er. Ah. What's your name anyway, I'm glad you're here and not just gone, I wanted to. Really be sure I knew that mysterious Gundam pilot-!"
<Pose Tracker> Jezebel Richens has posed.
All of a sudden, Jezebel has a lot to do. Well, she's on a break anyway, and isn't quite distracted enough by staring at the sickly mech to hear someone running at her. And then, to... wait patiently while she speaks. Her first instinct was actually to tell her to stop and slow down, and interrupt her, but she checks that one. Wrong call. Too rude, or too sharp, for someone who wants to talk to her. Bad first impression.
These people aren't severe, so she should try a little harder, too. "Uh -" But, she doesn't much know what to say. "- I didn't do much, I was pretty wrecked, too." Her head bobs to the side, indicating the Gundam there. "As you can see, I wasn't exactly hanging around that well, either." There is a lot more information there, that she has to try to grab out of the flow, or maybe torrent, of words. A name is easy. Facility she grew up in, shared with those people. Maybe she had a wrong impression, she thought that the one she was fighting was much older. Maybe that's a misunderstanding. Or, maybe, she's misunderstanding now? No need to interrogate that too much. Not this second. The things that matter are 'name' and 'thank you'. ... And, 'glad you're here'. That one feels nice.
"But, you're welcome. I heard you asking for help when I was floating around, and just..." Her shoulders bounce, and her head shakes. "Well, I'm glad I came to help. Jezebel Richens, just joined up with Mithril." That tracks, she is wearing roughly the same stuff as everyone else. The weird formality hangs in the air, and she laughs it off. "And, frankly, I don't think I was getting anywhere besides 'deeper' on my own. I was technically captured, you know." Her tone drops, and she speaks more quietly, like she's saying a secret, or a conspiracy. Desperately, she hopes that the joke is coming across. It looks so weird if the joke doesn't come across. She looks so weird, but the girl seems pretty keyed up, so...
<Pose Tracker> Seolla Schweizer has posed.
Seolla's patiently sipping away as Jezebel works past the stiffness and awkwardness of a first meeting - one Seolla knows well, were it not for the boiling need to perhaps 'keep things equal' with those she feels indebted to.
"-no, those three aren't any joke. Don't take it as some sort of embarrassment." Seolla gazes upwards at one of the overhanging light fixtures. "...Chienne, Chien, and Chiot Argent. I guarantee you they're the strongest people the School ever produced. Maybe some of the most ruthless fighters in the world. Strong enough to bust out of their own accord several years ago, maiming our...overseers in the process, and they've been living on the lam as mercs ever since - not to mention, they've somehow secured themselves three personal top-end mobile suits that work together as well as they do. Absolutely do not underestimate them. We're both lucky to be alive, especially since they were working with that Gauron guy's discretion, and he'd absolutely be over the moon if they started murdering people left and right. Eugh."
A strained little smile crosses Seolla's lips, fingertips tousling at her side-braid lazily as an ever-faint nervous tic. "...I'm glad it's Mithril who got me out of there, cause I think Chienne woulda tried to kill me even if I were on her side. Don't worry about it though! I'm glad you're with us. These people don't really...there's protocol and stuff, but they're not gonna bury you in red tape or refuse salvaging your suit to get people to safety. ...d-do you have to do something super important here while they're fixing, or do you want to head out? I can't stand being cooped up in facilities too long..."
<Pose Tracker> Jezebel Richens has posed.
Jezebel's face falls, then sharpens as she puts a hand up. "No, you're misunderstanding me." This one, she'll be sharper about, because it is important to her. First of all, if this girl gets the impression - very mistaken - that she doesn't take them seriously, what does that say about her, right? Her head shakes again, but it isn't as a cute joke set up. "No, I'm taking them deadly seriously. I'm not embarrassed to have lost, though, uh, it does feel bad, obviously. I lost because that guy - uh, Chien? - was better at fighting than me, so he beat me. Bad. I'm taking it plenty seriously, Ms. Schweizer." It doesn't matter that any of them are kids.
It doesn't matter that Seolla is a kid, either. Rather - "Whether we like it or not, the Federation has been putting people your age on that line for decades. Amuro Ray is the one we all know, but it happened other places, too, right? It's terrible, but it happens. Definitely happened outside of the EFSF, too. ... Obviously." It's all in that Gundam. Memories, crystallized into something more fake than memory. More than combat data. Less than a person. So, in other words, she has some understanding of how things are. She gets it.
"I understand well enough the look of teenagers going to war and killing people. They're really good, and that's what counts. It's better if it wasn't like that, and I hope you - we? - can help them." It's always been like this. Even now, it's still like this.
"I'm not looking down on those three. Or you. I hope you get that."
Her eyes are sharp, but not hard. And, she can't keep the look up for long, before it falters, and she sighs. "Sorry, that was a little intense. Nah, I'm good to go, let's get out of this cave." Killing her water bottle, she tosses it in the trash on the way out. "Wanna head outside? I don't know the place super well, yet."
<Pose Tracker> Seolla Schweizer has posed.
"Weeeeeell, it's not exactly scenic around here, since it's supposed to be a secret fortress island and legally it's a nature preserve and all that. Some would call that a bit of an oopsie," Seolla laughs with a shockingly high-wattage little smile and a finger against her cheek. For someone who's been through an unreasonable amount including very recent combat drug withdrawal, she's brighter than expected. "But yeah, it's this way-!"
And with that, Seolla's leading Jezebel through the perhaps maze-like internal passages of Merida Island's interior, before bringing her up an elevator and towards Seolla's personal favorite spot.
-befitting her tendency to Bird Behavior, the spot in question is waaaaaaay up on a cliff face outcropping on the central mountain, Seolla's arms spreading wide and catching the wind. It's about halfway up the total height, and offers quite the overlook of the crescent-shaped isle and the vast blue sea beyond. "...Obviously I'm not dressed for mountaineering, and the summit's waaaaaaay harder to get to, but it's not too tough to get down, there's an easy enough trail. You're not gonna have to do much climbing, and there's not any major annoying predators or anything in an island this far away from anything else. Lots of bugs though..."
<Pose Tracker> Jezebel Richens has posed.
It took a few turns to get lost, but gets lost she does on the way through the base. Ah, well, it's fine, she'll probably be able to get back where she's meant to be eventually. Jezebel laughs with her - it's a pretty good way to hide a base, right? Just pretend it's something else. The only thing that bothers her is that it seems like it would be a nightmare to set up all this stuff without having huge problems keeping it secret. Really, that's the most magic thing to her - how the hell does anyone make a secret base? It requires so much cement, and builders, and...
That line of thought breaks away once they're all the elevator. "Oh, wow." She's a little more shy about getting up on the cliff with her, though; she also has her arms out, but it's not catching the wind, and more about trying to keep her balance. But, she does manage it, and peaks over the edge and straight down. Takes a step back when she does that.
It is transparent. This woman is afraid of heights.
<Pose Tracker> Seolla Schweizer has posed.
Seolla, of course, had any ounce of height fear well and truly shoved out of her very early on. If anything, she is afraid of being too grounded. In the air, surrounded on all sides by miles of freedom - nothing could ever truly befall her. Nobody could detain or punish her. Flying around was what she lived for - that liberating moment of freedom.
It's so normal, that Jezebel's cautiousness is almost alien to her. Arms up and folded behind her head, Seolla's got a somewhat perplexed look, lips pursed. "...huh? What's wrong? ...Ohhhh, I get it. I know exactly what you're going through."
"You're afraid of a few bugs?"
A laugh behind her hand as she utterly fails to interpret it. Insects at least Seolla does get, since she also grew up in kinda sterile environments where they were strange and unwelcome sights. "...It's okay, it's okay! We don't have to go down to where they are at all. We can just hang out right here! I totally getcha." oh noooo
<Pose Tracker> Jezebel Richens has posed.
Jezebel has spent the last several years in space - it's been years since she was back on Earth. Actually, getting used to gravity again has been a little hard on its own, but up here she is much worse off, since there is a 'very real' danger of falling to her death. "What?" The wind makes her imagine she can't hear herself think, but it isn't that bad. It isn't like she's paralyzed with fear, or something like that.
She's like, fine, just really cautious. "What, no, it isn't the bugs. I mean, I don't like them, they're pretty relatively uncommon where I was before this, but no, it's falling." Gesturing towards the edge, and down. "It's fine in low-G, because there is a limit to how falling you can get, or in a cockpit, because that's basically not falling ever, but this? Kind of spooks me. I like looking out at the ocean from here, but looking down, not so much."
"It's a great spot, but I don't like the edge."
<Pose Tracker> Seolla Schweizer has posed.
The thought only now crosses Seolla that this is fairly high up - she bends forward just a little bit to peek out over the edge, and huffs out a little 'huh'. "...I never thought of it like that. I thought - a colony is kind of way up there in space, and you're sorta surrounded by stuff you've gotta fly through, so someone who's spent a lot of time up there being scared of heights is...unusual to think of! Well."
Seolla backs off from the very perilous precipice, and parks herself on a strategically located outcropping, tipping her thermos high in the air. "...It's fine as long as you stay pretty close, yeah? The secret is just to stay as far from falling as you can, ahaha."
The sun slowly dips near the horizon, sending a band of light shimmering across the Pacific waves that seemingly go on forever. Only a handful of little isles and reefs are visible off in the distance. "...So...what's pushing you onwards, huh? Like what gets you up in the morning? For me...I still have two precious people to rescue. But knowing that there's far, far more than just them...I'm bursting at the seams to stop that kinda abuse from ever happening again."
<Pose Tracker> Jezebel Richens has posed.
A different idea occurs to her. If she takes it literally enough, 'as far from falling' actually means 'already on the ground'. That's the first important thing to realize. After all, if you've already fallen, you do not need to be afraid of falling, having already fallen. From the bottom of the pit, the trepidation you feel at the top of the pit is no more. This makes sense to her; after all, she has reached the bottom of the pit, and is much more comfortable than the top. That's all fine.
An extension of the idea. It's wrong to go look at the problem of, 'I do not want to fall', and then decide 'I will stay away from the edge', even though that is a rational and practical conclusion to the problem presented. Rather, it isn't wrong, it's just inferior. Instead, a better question is, 'how can I get near to the edge without falling'; the inverse idea. The secret isn't to stay as far from falling as she can - it is to get as close to falling as she can, without actually doing it. Of course, that just brings her back to the first problem, of standing on the edge being scary. A second solution to support the resolution, a reframing of the question. 'In what way can I make being on the edge more comfortable, so I can be on the edge, and not fall.' And, so, from her approach, a solution arises.
Jezebel, mindfully, carefully, steps over to the edge, and sits, so her legs dangle, and she will not fall.
Turning to face Seolla, she puts her hands down, brushing at the stone a bit. "The Captain asked me something kinda like that. I think it's that... well, things are wrong, and I want to see how they can be better. To that end, I, uh, stole that Gundam and went rogue. Real rogue." But that was pretty vague, so she wants to try a better answer.
"Basically, I don't know what the future looks like. I think that the F90 is going to be a part of it, and I think I want to be the one that wields it to guide the future, even if it's just a nudge. But that's a big role, and I don't know how, so I'm here, because I have some trust that the people here have a good vision, and I want to be a part of that. I think that things can get really, really bad. But - maybe - we can make it a little better. If I didn't, eventually I'd get ground down into another boot on another face, so I had to jump. I think that makes most sense, but I am totally rambling."
<Pose Tracker> Seolla Schweizer has posed.
Seolla can practically hear the gears turning in Jezebel's head. (On some level she can literally hear it! Isn't the future's normalization of low-level psychic attunement nifty?) Eyes widening as she faces her fears oh so directly, and parks herself sitting down on the ledge. A little 'ohhhh!' followed by a clap of her hands - and Seolla joining her in that seating, a reasonable three feet away so as to avoid any worry of accidental jostling or pushing.
"Hah, nice! You're pretty good at tackling stuff this way, I can tell." A hand presses into Seolla's cheek, twisting a bit and tipping just forward enough to peek over into Jezebel's eyes with baleful blue wideness. "Sureness of your future, as long as you're holding onto something...I'm kinda jealous. If I don't think about the right here and right now..." A knot forms in Seolla's stomach. It's a touched on level of dread she hates thinking about, even now, even with all the help she's gotten. Jezebel in turn can likely feel an echo of it - Seolla's stronger with emotional expulsion than most.
"Nn. So we're in similar positions, huh? We're both gonna have people coming after us for stealing something of theirs, and they want us to get back to using what we can do to coerce people instead of helping them. ...A lot of what I did in stuff like Man Hunting operations is kind of a blank, since I was on some really nasty stuff for a lot of that time..." Seolla averts admitting that just as well her long term memory's still under some severe impairment - really, a lot of what she's done or who she's been past a year ago remains fuzzy and discolored. That much elicits a much, much stronger cold feeling off of Seolla's heart.
"...Don't worry about talking a lot! Like it or not, we're stuck together for the time being, and fortunately for you I kind of like it. Okay?" The barest hint of tsun-ery whenever Seolla's a touch stressed leaking out, the slightest formation of pouting and blustering. "...besides, I can go on a bit too, I've been told, ehehe..."
<Pose Tracker> Jezebel Richens has posed.
For a second, Jezebel has the idea that Seolla is mocking her a little bit. It just comes off as ever so slightly condescending, like she's clapping for a little kid, and she does feel a little silly about that for a second. But - that's way too little faith, yeah? She's probably not doing that, it would be a weird, rude turn all of a sudden, and she does seem pretty nice overall, so it's her imagination. Or, maybe, even, she feels like she should be just a little embarrassed for working so hard to come up with 'just sit down'. Her speaking makes her feel like it was more genuine.
"Oh, pah, no, god no, nothing nearly that sure." Snickering, she waves her left hand at her, shaking her head. "No, not at all. It's super unsure and unsteady. It could even be, like, wrong? It could be that I'm super out of line and things are going to fly apart. I think that's sort of par for the course with anything that's not super clear on the end goal." She's only occasionally looking at her, instead mostly looking at the ocean. This Earth is so beautiful.
"I do need to think more about the 'right now'. Not gonna do much good about solid footing, even if the path forward is unclear." A place to sit on the cliffside. "Maybe it's even that 'if you have a sure footing, you can even manage a rough or hard to see path'? I think that could be right." She's not just talking. She is paying close attention to her new friend, too. Low level psychic aside, she mostly psyches herself out of understanding other people. So, she listens real close, and maybe sometimes it comes across properly.
"My life is blank but uh not literally, just... because... I did not do anything. I got lucky to have a normal civilian life and just ended up stumbling on a way to change things, and then watched closely as they did not." A shrug. It's mildly hard to hear her, with the wind, which she seems to finally realize and turn to face Seolla properly.
"Sure thing. I didn't talk so much before I came here. I guess I didn't have much to say. Now, it's like my head is bursting with thoughts, and I don't know how to get them out besides talking a lot."
<Pose Tracker> Seolla Schweizer has posed.
-Seolla's being genuine! Overcoming fears is respectable, even if it's simple tasks! There's the Helpful Life Lesson of this whole trip!
A shifting of her hips later, and Seolla does...scoot backwards from the edge of the cliffside just a bit. Unsteadiness in the rocks reels her in just a bit. Rummaging in her little thermal-lined pack, Seolla procures two ~fairly boring~ ration bars, unpeeling one slightly and handing it off to Jezebel. "They're kinda flavorless, but they're a good fill-up. I'm kinda used to things tasting...really bland, so don't be surprised when I pick stuff that feels like chewing on drywall, ahah."
A bit of nibbling later. Mogu mogu. ...and then Seolla's own bar is gone. By all means she absolutely scarfed the thing down, but it really did look like she just nipped at it a bit at a time. How uncanny!
"Let's give everyone a sure footing, kay? -actually, I'll add you on VERTEX, since the rest of the Uruz team told me it was a good way to keep in touch." She holds her phone out, ready for the amazing art of tap-to-add contact sharing technology. Her own VERTEX profile is . . . a blank default profile image, and a vague nonsense string of numbers, but that's for ~personal protection~ since there's fairly powerful people trying to track her down and abduct her!
<Pose Tracker> Jezebel Richens has posed.
First, Jezebel takes the ration bar, but then before she really gets to unwrap it, Seolla has finished hers. And then, by the time she has it half unwrapped, she's trying to add her on VERTEX. That's fine, she just pins it under her chin into her chest for a second, then fumbles her phone out of her pocket to tap it. "Uruz... yeah, I should, uh, try to know them." Mild embarrassment rolls off her. It's ok. She has time.
"Yeah, for sure, we should definitely do that." Then she finally gets to actually get to the bar, and... you know, it isn't terrible. But, her 'soldier cred' is actually pretty shallow, given that she spent a lot of her career as a cadet in a good academy, and then an officer on an expensive station somewhere. Her time eating cheap military food is pretty much isolated to 'a few weeks in basic', rather than 'as a lifestyle'. That's all to say that the bar just sucks, but she'll be fine. It isn't gross, or anything, but it isn't anything at all.
"It really is like drywall." Jezebel's profile is more or less unconfigured, and was made three days ago. "I guess I don't dislike it, exactly, but I'd probably put some hot sauce on it."
<Pose Tracker> Seolla Schweizer has posed.
"Ahahah, I know right, it's an art to learn how to choke stuff like this down. It's dehydrated to hell and back, which really just means you've gotta keep a big jug of water with you at all times. But that's basic stuff! Hot sauce though...that's also not a bad idea. A small splash of flavor might go a long way. Usually I try to keep lightly loaded though, so even a little bottle of the stuff might impact the kit I wear. But I'll think about it~"
Post securing Jezebel's contact though, Seolla murmurs to herself, fiddling on her phone in a way that's totally rude in polite company, but it's clear something's on her mind. "...say though. I'm usually not supposed to do this, especially not here. But. The sunset's really gorgeous. ...one picture when I don't even have cell service and can block GPS and everything should be fine, right? I'll do my best to even block out the landscape and stuff and just keep it to the sky and the clouds. ...can we share a picture together, is what I'm getting at?"
She's turning herself back to the cliff, and scooting forward a little to be well away from the ledge.
<Pose Tracker> Jezebel Richens has posed.
To be honest, Jezebel knows better. About a thousand security briefs flash in her mind, from when she was first in the Academy to when she was getting her clearances to work on the Gundam to just a few days ago, when Mithril made it really clear, again, what the best practices are. She knows that, the best practice and the right way to do things is to 'definitely not do that'. It's not okay. Even without GPS, even without cell service, it is still technically dangerous. It being just a picture of the cloud and sky is reasonably safer... and so is never posting it... but it's also safest to just never do that in a way that can be at all determined. It's just not the right way to do stuff. ... But, all the same, it really will probably be fine, especially if she keeps it to herself. She's quiet again, while she thinks.
Bad move. Bad move. Bad move. She knows it's totally a bad move. Maybe not for the practical reason of 'it is against policy', because she's at least pretty sure that it won't expose the island or anything, if they take a picture that doesn't show the shape. A sunset is a sunset for very many places on Earth. Technically, the exposure risk then is that they would know Jezebel and Seolla know one another, and are friends, but that isn't likely to be a secret that's reasonable to keep in the mid to long term anyway - as soon as the F90 sorties, they're pretty much made - but still, it sits wrong. A deep breath. "Don't like, ever post it." In theory, the way the ambiguous 'they' - Seolla mentioned a school? Suppose it could also be EFSF people, or SNRI people - would see it would be by capturing the girl. And, at that point, a lot of things are getting leaked anyway. That thought, as 'comforting' as it is, makes her stomach churn. She shakes her head, and refocuses.
"Yeah, okay, just don't ever post it." Once the decision is made, though, it's made, and she evens right back out, smiling, and scooting over closer to her. Timidly - at first - she puts a hand at her back, to help keep her steady. And she can be steadier, like that. No way she's going to fall. "It is a beautiful sunset, after all." Seolla asked genuinely for this, so she'll make it fine. She can grab on that, firmly, and make it work.
It's a beautiful sunset. It'll be a beautiful photo.
<Pose Tracker> Seolla Schweizer has posed.
"Oh, absolutely, no way am I ever, ever posting it. This is just...for the sake of my own memories. I don't know how long I'll be sure that this moment happened, but I want to be able to look back and know that it did. It doesn't matter to anyone else in the world, just to me."
That long train of uncertainty definitely rings out to Seolla. It's an irresponsible move, she knows. But. But! They can't be so unsafe that one little picture, of one little encounter, that happened Somewhere, Some Day, Where The Sea Is Visible, Like It Is On Most Of The Planet, including on a boat, is something to regret.
Maybe if this were a ridiculously tragic movie, Seolla figures, but that thought's gonna shake out of her head.
A stiffening in her posture comes from the hand on Seolla's back - a bit of her is unprepared for this kind of gesture and support. "W-wait, what's the big idea with getting so-" She swallows tightly, though. Sweat lining the side of her face - surely just the heat. It takes active Tsun Suppressant, but she manages to sigh out her prickly instincts, and instead -
Leans into it. Phone held out with one arm, her other mirrors Jezebel's support around her back. Careful to angle the shot so nothing is visible besides smiles and sky, Seolla's arm is outstretched and fussing with the exact right shot, in exactly the right way. Slight grumbling as she maneuvers around the other end of the island's slight hilly rise - before, the sun framing their backs in an almost perfect circle-
One shutter, and a memory's sealed into captivity.