2024-05-19: .in another's house shall i meet my enemy with consideratioN
- Log: .in another's house shall i meet my enemy with consideratioN
- Cast: Yuliana Kafim, Eight Orlodhari
- Where: The Photon Power Labs
- Date: 2024-05-19
- Summary: Yuliana returns to the PPL for further treatment, realising she needs help to stay away from her God-Wife. There she meets Eight, and tells her about what's been happening to her -- and about the Muse Malu 3 she created. Since she's minding her manners, they spent a lot more time talking about their children instead of anything they might argue over.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
OST: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzKlcX2BR6M CHVRCHES - Final Girl
Yuliana decided that it was time to return to the PPL, finally, because their Photonic Neuromodulation Therapy was helping; she fears, though she would never say, that it was her delay between treatment rounds which let the Empress drag her to Her side, not so long ago.
(It's not that simple, of course; even if her therapy made her insight more infrequent, encouraging different neural connections can't erase all that was done. Yuliana is prone to thinking of things in two shades, with no variance in-between.)
When the stealth shuttle 'Ghost' alights in the PPL's hangars, it's well past dinnertime; while it's harder to sneak out of the Silent Castle, with the eternal Arctic daylight, she can certainly time her arrival to be under cover of night. It's better for everyone if Yuliana isn't detected, when she comes here. NUNE would be fine if they caught her dead or alive, after all.
It comes to rest beside a small Mobile Weapon in the next berth -- a bare five metres tall, though it's fifteen metres long. That length, as it happens, is quite important, because the Muse Malu 3 has twenty-four pairs of legs clustered about it, with a bare half-a-metre spacing between each leg, plus a few metres dedicated to its headparts and tail. It creates a sensation that it simply has too many legs, even before addressing the water cannon on its back or the beam rifles mounted to its sides or the way its many eyes are missiles.
And when Yuliana alights from her stealth shuttle -- it's painted to be rather inconspicuous -- of course she wants to go and take a look at it. "Hey!" She remarks, to herself, brightening. "They added extra solar panels! I wonder if that was Koyan's idea..."
She's already changed out of her Arctic clothing into something more suitable for the Japanese heat, of course -- jeans and a grey t-shirt advertising SNAFU ZAKU's emblem, alongside a green and blue silk scarf wrapped about her neck. She has her usual purple bracelet on, of course, but it's now joined by two matching black chain-link bracelets on each wrist -- and black studs in her ears, all decorated with emerald gems.
And her ridiculously expensive wedding ring, naturally.
<Pose Tracker> Eight Orlodhari has posed.
Eight was also here! With an interest in new therapies, the matter of Photon Power supplements for Magallanica, and discussion of other matters... Admiral Orlodhari was here on business, but as is often the case when visiting the PPL, she brought her family. This is usually great, but...
Zaress absolutely refused to settle, and Aarmi was so distressed by all the noise that she wouldn't settle either, and by the time Eight finished her business and got back to help Lavhi calm them, it was a bad idea to just get going.
A trip would be worse, given the circumstances.
So it is that Eight Orlodhari is here when she feels Yuliana's presence. She was just on her way to the hangar, by happenstance, to check out the new relief unit she'd heard about. So shortly...
Eight approaches, in mom jeans and a red blouse, and comes to a stop a bit away from Yuliana. "...Yuliana," she greets.
This is where she would ordinarily add 'it's good to see you' but until she sees what kind of mood Yuliana's in, she's not sure that's the case.
"You're looking at the new unit, too?"
A pause. "Hope your trip wasn't too bad."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yuliana's jeans aren't mom-shaped so much as just generally plus-size, but there are comparisons which can be made, certainly. She turns, and puts a smile on; she is being polite and keeping her frills folded behind her ears, which means that her horrible aura, at least, is limited to the area directly around her.
Those horrible snake-things are definitely staring at Eight, though, even if her (supposedly private) explainer to her followers explained how they sense vibrations instead of seeing things.
"Kapitan," she greets her, and she's probably in a good mood, because she's still speaking Zaftran. "Net -- Admiral flota, da?" A moment's pause, and she smiles, switching to a more comfortable language for the other woman. "That is to say... you're the Fleet Admiral, these days, aren't you?" That's not literally what she said, but, well, tag questions just aren't as popular in one of her native languages. The fact she's so fond of them is just another example of how many she speaks. "Congratulations."
She shrugs, lightly, shaking her head. "They did catch wind of me at one point," she sighs, "but I did manage to lose them, eventually. Though it's made me a touch late... you're quite a late visitor yourself, it seems."
She turns back to the Muse Malu 3, smiling again. "Still," she says, "it's nice what they've done with it, isn't it?" Which implies she's familiar with the mobile weapon, anyway.
<Pose Tracker> Eight Orlodhari has posed.
Technically, any jeans Eight wears are mom jeans, but these are especially so. Eight at least doesn't feel that aura all around her just now...
But the snakes are staring. Eight did see the explainer, of course. She's in charge of a spy network. that happens.
She decides not to treat it as weird.
Besides; she gets congratulated. Eight is a little surprised by that, and it shows by a lifted blone eyebrow--and then a smile, because that's the appropriate reaction. "Thank you," she says. For the compliment, or the linguistic shift? Her own English is a mix of Zeonic and common colonial--but her accent is closest to AEU Scotland.
"Magallanica Defense Force," she confirms.
Then, Yuliana explains... "I see. Glad you lost them." And that much is true, even if the reasons aren't just concern for Yuliana's well-being. "...the twins weren't up for the trip back," she explains. Yuliana might get it, her tone suggests--Eight remembers Maksim and Makar. "So we'll leave in the morning."
"You're familiar," Eight notices of the machine. "It is nice, though. Something like this would be very useful in rescue operations..."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Zeonic English is hardly Yuliana's preferred variation of English, but she can operate in it, at least. She fought in Bloody Valentine; she had to be able to understand the enemy.
"Ah, is that so?" She asks, tilting her head, with a look of sympathy of all things as Eight talks about her fussy children. "Yes, the boys were quite unsettled when I was leaving... though you can hardly blame them, after what happened. I'll have to call, once I'm settled in... it's the middle of the day over there, after all."
Yuliana laughs, though, when Eight notices that she's familiar with the Muse Malu 3. "I should hope I'm familiar," she says, "since I designed it!" Wait, Yuliana made the rescue machine?!
<Pose Tracker> Eight Orlodhari has posed.
Sympathy! That at least does make sense to Eight, as strange as it is to see sympathy out of her of all people. "It's harder and easier on them, when I bring them on these trips; it means they don't have to miss me, but travel can be stressful." She can't bring thm on every trip these days. Not with her work, for certain.
Still, "After what happened?" Eight wonders. "Are they all right?"
A pause, then. "Well! Good work." She's surprised, but it would be rude to say 'i'm surprised you made something that isn't horrible' so she doesn't. "It looks like a fine design."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Oh, yes," Yuliana assures her, "I kept them out of trouble, so they're all right. We've got them seeing a therapist by distance -- we're a touch too isolated to take them into town, you understand." Which at least means Elisa isn't taking care of their therapy.
Wait, therapy for what?!
She folds her arms behind her head, with a broad shrug. "It is, isn't it?" She asks, pleasant enough. "I ended up going in a search-and-rescue direction with the whole thing -- particularly after talking it over with Chris. She was so enthused by the possibilities!" The zipline on the undercarriage which can transport people out of wreckage in a hurry was also her idea, but Yuliana doesn't mention that. Neither does she mention that the first few failed iterations were focused on urban warfare, which might explain why the fourth adapted back to that purpose so well. It's hardly her fault if fighting in human environments and saving humans from their wrecked environments has some overlap, is it?
"Utility wanzers have a long history, of course," she adds, "particularly in rural areas. You'd be surprised how many Tenduses were repurposed for logging and firetrail clearing, frankly. But something like this isn't much use at home, so I ended up bequeathing the plans and the prototypes to the Photon Power Labs, instead. It's an unfortunate truth that this city is terribly popular to assault." Mostly by Dr. Hell, who is dead, but Dr. Hell dying is generally more of a temporary setback. "They're quite easy to assemble on a budget -- you can imagine that even with our wealth, hobbyist development tends to be a touch more limited." Which means she's just making death machines now?!
<Pose Tracker> Eight Orlodhari has posed.
"That's good," Eight says first. But a therapist. Eight can imagine plenty of reasons children at that place might need them, but she doesn't want to imagine. Instead, "What happened?" she wonders.
The direct approach!
But the rest, "I see..." Chris. Is it the same Chris? Well, it might be. In any case, it certainly means that it wasn't planned in that direction until after the design started.
Utility wanzers, of course, are not alien to Eight Orlodhari. And if they had been once, they aren't now. But in terms of what's useful at home or not... it's an interesting question.
"Well," she says, "I'm glad Fujinomiya can count on them. You must do a lot of work, if you can hand over a prototype like this. I can certainly imagine that."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"It's complicated," is how Yuliana dismissed that query. "Give me a moment, would you?"
Which explains why she's talking about the machines first.
And she laughs, again, tilting her head back into her hands. "A lot of work? I don't really think of it that way. I'm just often idle, these days, now I'm out of the military. A woman must have an occupation, don't you think?" Even with all the time she spends with her wife, and her family, Yuliana evidently has plenty of time left over. Being Castle rich is clearly good for her stress levels. "And while I do quite enjoy putting together those clever little models Leina signed me up for, there's really nothing like solving problems at scale."
At some point she's going to reveal to Sayaka, most likely in a casual conversation which wasn't nearly ready for it, that she's said all this to the spy boss of Magallanica. And she isn't going to see a single problem with taking all this credit and blabbing everything so openly. No wonder her position in the special forces was a gilded cage; she's far too unstable to be trusted with opsec!
(If Sayaka didn't want her to know, well, clearly she shouldn't have let Eight wander into the hangars. It's hardly Yuliana's fault.)
She sighs, though, her hands dropping down to her sides again as she turns from the Muse Malu 3 back to Eight. "But you asked about what happened, didn't you?" She asks, finally coming back to it. "It's something of a tale -- shall we sit?"
There are benches in the hangar, obviously. Where are the engineers supposed to sit on their breaks? Yuliana wanders over to one, and sits down; she's even thoughtful enough to sit at the far end of it, compared to the one beside it. The fact that she can lean against a corner in doing so surely has nothing to do with it. It's all consideration for Eight!
Probably.
"We were having a picnic outside, you see," she says, "when young Makar -- he's still five, you know -- he wandered onto thin ice. Well, it all happened at once... I ran off to toss him somewhere more solid, but if it was unsteady under him, you can imagine how the ice certainly couldn't support me. So I fell in, and the Arctic, you know, it's terribly cold. And the ice..."
She trails off, looking into the middle distance. "I heard Her," she says, distantly, "calling me to Her. Then, I don't remember anything... I'm told my wife dove in after me and drew the water from my lungs. Thanks to her efforts, I suffered no frostbite, but you can imagine the family was quite shaken... the poor boys were beside themselves, let alone my mother. And, I realised..."
Yuliana shakes her head. "... let's just say the Empress wasn't pleased to realise how offended I was She would just watch me perish." And some of those words are in OCU English; she's just substituting the ones she can't recall in Zeonic, because Eight ought to know. "That's why I came back here... it's all the more important I'm able to keep my distance from Her, now. Not that I'm worried about Her intruding on me, any more, of course -- my wife saw to that -- it's just..."
She sighs, her fingers resting on her wrist. (On her bracelet.) "I'm afraid I'm something of a weak link in the chain," she says. "I am too likely to capitulate."
<Pose Tracker> Eight Orlodhari has posed.
It's complicated, Yuliana says, but she indicates she will tell Eight, so that's good enough for Eight. She listens to the rest, instead. It's certainly interesting information. A woman and an occupation... "True," Eight agrees; she has her work, too. Though she doesn't have a castle. "There's nothing quite like it," she agrees--though her solutions are different. Manpower, more than manuals.
The blonde moves to sit on the other bench, as expected, to listen without joining that particular space. And she hears quite the tale. Her features knit in alarm and concern at the matter of thin ice. "!" she says wordlessly, and then Yuliana explains how they all lived through it. Him, through Yuliana's quick action, and her, through...
"Yes," Eight says. "I can imagine how distressing that might've been." The idea of a child nearly falling into the ice is bad enough to chill Eight's heart, but the rest...
Eight is as familiar with OCU English given her time in the commercial colonies, so she understands them, even if it sounds a little strange to her ear to hear them voiced with the rest. The Empress...
"I see. Well, I'm glad you lived," she says sincerely. She looks at the bracelet. Her wife saw to that...
"...I'm not going to blame you for having trouble standing up to a god," Eight says then. "Does that mean you're not... interested in calling Her up anymore, then?" She has to think about it to capitalize the 'h', but she figures Yuliana will appreciate it.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"We have no more desire to bring the Empress to this world," Yuliana says. She still treats Her with the most proper of nouns; it's more difficult to leave aside Her divinity, even with her rebellion. "No... in fact, we shall defeat Her, and claim the Void as our own."
She's still quite distant, as she says: "The Void did not begin with the Empress. The Void shall not end with Her, either. She colonised a dead land... a land connected with me by my birthright." Was it not through Cypripedioidea's blessing that Siti Dian came to that land?
It's the only explanation.
"Besides... She hurts me," Yuliana pouts. "Quite terribly, you know. Opened my chest up like a blooming flower, just to flay the betrayal from my bared heart. She even made me hurt my wife!" Predictably, Yuliana doesn't explain what parts of that sequence were a dream versus reality. "She could have helped me, you know. Given me gills, or ice-breaking appendages, or -- it's not as if She's not changed me before, in the space between life and death. But this time, She just watched! She just watched," Yuliana repeats herself, more quietly, hugging her arms to her chest.
"... it's not fair." Not fair on her.
<Pose Tracker> Eight Orlodhari has posed.
"I see." Eight is relieved to hear that, though she is wary enough to wonder what Yuliana wants instead--and indeed, it's... to claim the Void for herself? Eight tilts her head thoughtfully. She hadn't realized that was a thing one could do.
But Yuliana explains. Her... birthright. "Hm."
Eight does not interrupt. She winces, at the description, because somehow she is sure it is all too literal somehow. Or at least, the feeling might've been real. "...She just watched," Eight repeats.
"...No, it's not," Eight agrees. She's not sure the real direction fairness would take here, but certainly not this.
"Well, good luck. So far as I can tell, She's the enemy of our world. It must be daunting, to think of traveling to a whole new realm..."
"I admit," Eight says, "I'd hold onto this one, given the choice. But good luck, Yuliana. Maybe that'll show you the peace you hope for."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"This world..." Yuliana sighs, looking down. "... we never much humoured staying. I mean, I do like it here, but..." She shakes her head, and reclaims her certainty. "We can't remain here," she says, looking back to Eight with those strange, endless eyes. "So many will not suffer me to live."
Cathedra, after all, has declared her a witch, just like her wife.
It's an uncomfortable subject to linger on, though, so she move to one they can both agree on: "The boys are doing well. It's why my visit here was delayed a few weeks -- you can imagine they were rather clingy. Not that I much wanted to leave them, either..." She sighs, with a faint smile. "I had to be sure Maksim didn't blame himself, you know, for goading his little brother. He can hardly be blamed for having so much bravado... or so much to prove. And Makar was right there, when it happened, so of course he was scared for a long time... I scraped his knees in my haste to get him out of the way, the poor dear. Haa, I guess it could have been worse..."
And Eight may well be able to imagine how much worse it might have been, a Cyber-Newtype tossing a child out of the way. She may, by that same measure, be able to tell that Yuliana was trying to be gentle, even in such a split-second situation.
<Pose Tracker> Eight Orlodhari has posed.
Did 'we' never humor it, Eight wonders? Still, what she says makes sense, at least. "That would be difficult," she allows. "Given all that's happened."
Can it be real, that Yuliana could improve for all that though? She is trying. And she has a family to look out for...
But they don't linger. Instead, "That's good," Eight answers. "I always have a hard time leaving mine," she answers in sympathy. But the matter of gentleness, and self-blame.. it comes together pretty quickly for Eight. "Better some scraped knees than down into the water," Eight says. "I know you did your best."
She does know that much.
"...I'm lucky in that," she says. "Half-Zentradi bones are very strong. The twins are quite resilient. ...But it doesn't stop me worrying, all the same."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Well, of course Yuliana and Elisa Kafim came to the decision together. In fact, Yuliana makes most of their decisions, and Elisa supports her in what she wants to do!
(And if Elisa supports her to make those decisions and to want what she wants, well, that just proves how dutiful and dedicated her wife is.)
"You're right," Yuliana smiles. "I did. I didn't think terribly much about it, but -- Lettu did say it was a good impulse." Shockingly, not all of Yuliana's impulsive behaviours lead to Ruining Rena's Life. (Unfortunately, a non-zero amount do.) "Even with my wife's magic, I don't know if he would have survived those waters... it was difficult to sleep, for a while."
Breaking news: Yuliana can be kept awake at night by someone else's welfare. Now, granted, Makar is family, but surely that's progress!
"But yes, I imagine your babies are much hardier!" She adds, looking back to Eight. "My mother-in-law tells me that when she tossed my wife into the air, she only sometimes bothered to catch her. And she was quite delighted by the whole affair!" Normally she wouldn't tell her wife's baby stories to the enemy, but, well, the enemy is also a mother to Zentradi children, and it's not as if they're enemy enemies in this context. Elisa will understand that it's for the sake of half-Zentradi child welfare. (Half-Zentradi child welfare apparently involves some risk.)
<Pose Tracker> Eight Orlodhari has posed.
It's fine.
It was a good impulse! Unlike... a lot of other ones. But Eight is sympathtic to this one, as it happens. And she notes the potential limits of Elisa's magic. "...Of course." It would be difficult.
It's... like progress!
But Yuliana is familiar, apparently. Yuliana's mother-in-law... "...I can imagine that," Eight says. "Lavhi's parents were a little... inexperienced, to start." There is that. "Whether they like it or not I do not plan to miss catching them."
Elisa will understand... something.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yuliana doesn't think he'd survive, anyway. And perhaps he wouldn't, at least in any form she'd appreciate. Not that she's calling her wife's magic evil, or anything like that, you understand. It's just...
(It's extremely evil magic.)
"Really? I'm told it's good for their development -- helps their bones develop as strongly as they ought to, and teaches them about impacts. Mamochka has told me many stories of half-Zentradi who weren't tossed as youths growing into children who climbed unreasonably high, too confident in their capacity, for they'd only ever tripped from standing." Oh no. Why would Yuliana tell Eight a story like that.
"That said," she adds, with a shrug, "I can't really blame you, all in all. The boys are of the age to love being tossed about, themselves, but with how big they've gotten I've had to insist my wife or I do the throwing -- or my mother-in-law -- for I'm all too concerned for what happens should we not catch them. They're light enough for us, but our fathers and my mother are a little too old to be able to heft them safely..." She laughs, lightly, tilting her head. "... though, mamochka was a Meltrandi warrior, so she really is built quite different."
She pauses, and adds: "Do be prepared for that, by the way. They only want to go higher as they get older."
<Pose Tracker> Eight Orlodhari has posed.
Super, super evil magic.
But Yuliana... says something that Eight is dubious about. She lifts an eyebrow. "Learning about impacts is one thing, but..." She is not so sure she believes about the overconfident falls.
...She'll ask Lavhi's parents.
"Lavhi and I are both pretty strong," Eight says, "Though..." Rasima isn't, but Eight decides not to mention her assistant. "Well, that makes sense. My parents still like to hold mine, too."
A pause. Higher...
"...Of course." A pause. "Well, they're still very small. Nineteen months."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Oh!" Yuliana claps her hands together. "Why, they're over a year and a half old now! Soon you'll have toddlers!" And of course she's delighted about the babies, but in the back of her head, she marks down five months in the future in her mind.
You know. Just in case she has to do something while Eight is distracted by her kids terrorising everyone.
"It really doesn't feel like that long since they were born..." Yuliana, of course, helped, so she knows when that happened. Roughly. "Have they begun speaking, yet?"
<Pose Tracker> Eight Orlodhari has posed.
"Yes," Eight answers, smiling. "They're really growing."
It's delightful! But that might be a thing.
"It doesn't, does it?" Eight asks. "For me sometimes, too. At the same time, it feels like it's been a while!"
A pause. "They have! Zaress especially has a lot to say most of the time. Aarmi's quieter, but not so quiet that we're worried."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Oh, wonderful!" Yuliana smiles. It's also delightful. "Be sure to expose them to a lot of languages -- the more they pick up when they're first learning, the easier it will be for them to learn what they'd like to speak when they're older. Why, we spoke four languages in our home!"
She sighs, gesturing with an open palm. "The children largely only spoke Zaftran -- so they've struggled a little with picking up more English, now they're out of the Republic. Of course, they're still doing very well, but it would be easier had Lyubov put on the state channel now and then." The REA's state media is, naturally, televised in Chinese first. "Many parents don't realise that some skills can only be easily acquired in youth..."
<Pose Tracker> Eight Orlodhari has posed.
"I will," Eight sys, because it's actually good advice. Four languages... that is more than Eight usually has going, of course. Maybe she could arrange some additional languages beyond the two obvious ones...
"Living the way we do, of course, they're exposed to a lot of new things a lot of the time."
But, the children--yes, of course. "I see. Yes, that would make a difference."
Skills acquired in youth...
"Well," Eight says, "I'm glad to hear yours are well, at least. ...I should probably let you get to calling them, and get back to mine."
"...But I hope things go well for your family."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yuliana does, shockingly, occasionally have good advice. Sometimes it even isn't secretly sinister!
"It's good for them, I think," Yuliana says, of that exposure.
But she looks surprised, when Eight reminds her she was supposed to call them. "Oh? Oh!" She forgot about what she was supposed to do because she got distracted talking to whoever will listen. That's... a little sad. "Yes, of course -- I do hope they'll be more settled when you get back to them. And I'm glad to hear your well-wishes for mine. You'll excuse me," she says, as she unfurls from the bench, and heads over to get her pack so she can head up to her guest room.
The kids are, of course, very happy to hear from her.