2024-07-20: Scar of Atrocity ~ To Become Divided
- Cast: Asciel Colette, Anita Rosetta
- Where: Side 1 - Colony 30
- Date: U.C. 0099 07 20
- Summary: On that day, 14 years ago, one at the center of the storm had so much torn away from her, and another, far away, had so much forced within it. It's only fitting that the halves of them that are artificial are on opposing sides.
<Pose Tracker> Asciel Colette has posed.
...It really is hard to believe that something so abhorrent happened here in the not too distant past.
Gazing upwards at the inner cylinder walls of Colony 30, Asciel Colette takes in one of those comforting false breaths, reaching up to trail her finger along one of the vast transparent panes between this place and the cosmos.
...Fourteen years ago, ten million people died here, all at once, from a grave atrocity that ultimately set off the Gryps Conflict against the Titans. The pain is so vast as to be unimaginable.
And yet, on that very day, it's like that pain seared a mark into Asciel. Despite how much is changed, she remembers it more vividly than she should. It had nothing to do with her. She shouldn't have even had something as irrational as 'emotions' to care about it.
But here she is. It's not by accident that on the same date, several years later, Asciel adopted this name.
Seeing the interior of this colony perfectly tranquil and inhabited, like nothing in the world ever happened to it - seeing people having moved back in and picked up the livelihoods of those tragically lost souls right where they left off...it puts a sour face on Asciel's lips with each bakery, each workshop, each apartment building she passes. All she can ruminate to herself, clutching her heart with such a pained expression, is:
"None of this is yours."
...In the interim between now and her planned performance, Asciel's tinkering away at a festively decorated, repurposed Mobile Suit in a warehouse she's rented out, relatively close to the center of town. It's clearly a Loto, but whose arms are replaced with several banks of fireworks launchers, and it's hunkered forward in its more tank-like configuration. She's left the front garage doors open, largely to give herself more space, earning her occasional curious glances from onlookers. On a number of speakers in the building, that slightly melancholic brand of music Asciel favors is blasting at full volume. Completing the presentation, Asciel's even humbly dressed in oil-stained overalls and slacks, surrounded by haphazardly scattered wrenches.
...For how festive the Loto looks, painted in bright fireworks tampos, Asciel herself certainly seems grouchy getting the thing in shape...
<Pose Tracker> Anita Rosetta has posed.
Fourteen years ago, ten million people died. Anita's family had fled the colony just a short time before - but they died all the same. And with them, and the colony, Anita lost everything. Her home. Her family. Even her body, her left side now fully cybernetic replacements.
It was difficult, coming here again. She couldn't have managed it if she hadn't brought Rena with her - she almost didn't manage it even with her, looking over the colony, so familiar, it's layout still a part of her muscle memory to this day, and yet completely different on the inside. But she made it...
...And here she is again. On her own, this time. She doesn't want to have to lean on Rena forever, doesn't want to be dependent on her. Rena helped her make the first time, so she makes this second one on her own.
Anita finds her way to the center of town, to the warehouses. She was just walking by idly at first, but from one of them, she hears music blasting out. Melancholy. Anita pauses in her steps, looking that way. One of the warehouses has its doors open, and inside... that's a Loto, isn't it? That's a classic. With festive decorations, and fireworks launchers instead of its arm missiles... Is someone planning something? It's an interesting project, especially for a place like this.
Well, she can't help it, now.
Anita approaches curiously. And the person working hard on it...
"Working hard?" Anita asks, leaning against the side of the garage doors. She has her usual calm, though that easy, good cheer of hers is somewhat subdued.
<Pose Tracker> Asciel Colette has posed.
There's a splash of hydraulic fluid on Asciel's cheek when Anita makes her presence known. Craning her head over her left shoulder - there's a momentary luminous glow in Asciel's orange eye, refocusing on the lounging Anita. Part of her thinks, for a moment, that it's an inconvenience to have someone stop by and rest here...
But then she turns back to her messy project at the guts of the Loto's torso, and tosses her arms up slightly. "Aaah, I'm always working exceptionally hard! Especially since everything is always up to me. You-"
Asciel turns, again, far more sharply, recognizing Anita hazily- then in sharper focus. "...You're...mnnnn...you're one of the ones I met...during my forays in concert with Captain Orlodhari and her cohort. ...mn. It takes me a bit to remember names and faces, especially when I'm so often far more focused on the bigger picture crisis at hand. ...mmnnnnn...nnnnnn...Anita, if I'm not mistaken."
Twisting around to take a seat on the Loto's front tread module, Asciel remembers the turbulent contexts she met Anita - and hazy vestiges of that fluid reality within Goragon especially induce a twinge of pain in her expression.
"What brings you to this place, so close to an anniversary of its former death? ...Happenstance, or purpose related to that? ...It's relatively important to me, this place, because it's when I...became..."
The idol trails off, finally getting a lucid, unoccupied opportunity to genuinely look at Anita...and it's obvious that orange iris is fixed straight on Anita's cybernetic arm and leg. Fingertips rising to touch her lower lip, Asciel can't help but blurt out, "Doesn't it feel odd to...have half of yourself in such a state...?"
<Pose Tracker> Anita Rosetta has posed.
Anita watches Asciel as she turns, taking note of the glow in her eye. If she's too much of an inconvenience, she doesn't mind making herself scarce - but Asciel doesn't ask, so she doesn't offer.
"Everything, huh?" Anita repeats with a whistle - and then, Asciel recognizes her. Anita listens intently.
"Got it in one. Been a while, huh? What's it been, a couple of years?" Anita replies. Bigger picture crises, huh... She has thoughts on that, but she keeps it to herself for now.
Asciel asks why she's here - but then she gets distracted, focusing on her limbs. Anita takes the question in stride. She raises her left hand a bit, turning it around and flexing her fingers, briefly. The limbs are the most obvious... but even her eyes are replacements.
"Odd, huh? I guess so. It was at first. The rehabilitation period was killer. And I'd be lying if I said it was all perfect." She replies. "Hard to remember what it was like before, though."
She flexes her fingers one last time into a fist, before folding her arms in front of her and thinking back to what she had been asked before - and what had almost been said, before Asciel trailed off.
"This place is important to you though, huh? ...Guess we're in the same boat. Me, I've got a lot of memories wrapped up in this place. Figured it was time I'd see it for myself again." She replies.
<Pose Tracker> Asciel Colette has posed.
"It really...has been a long while, hasn't it..." Asciel realizes aloud that the Denver Colony incident was nearly two years ago - but the ensuing months were so chaotic, to say nothing of how much adaptation it took for her afterwards...
"Rehabilitation...mn. I think I understand what you mean." There's a little bit of mimicry, mirroring Anita's motions, Asciel stretching and tightening her own fingers. And yet, despite everything, Asciel looks down at that hand - that perfectly ordinary-looking arm, and can't help but frown. "...How well do you have a sense of touch in that side of you? I...don't have anything of the sort."
Procuring a remote from a pocket on her overalls, Asciel clicks a button to open overhead shutters to let more light into the warehouse, then begins swiveling the firework armatures on the Loto, legs dangling over the edge of the tank treads. "It's the first time I've been here. ...It's the first time, and yet, somehow, I vividly feel like I remember it sometimes. ...Are those memories from before that tragedy happened? It's an incident I've never forgiven, you know. ...After all, if I did let go, I might just fall over, and go right back to the way I was..."
<Pose Tracker> Anita Rosetta has posed.
"It sure has." Anita agrees with a nod. The way she said it... it's like it only just hit her. Well, Anita can hardly blame her. A lot's happened.
She nods again, as Asciel comments on rehabilitation.
"...Yeah. It took like... two years before I was really able to move like I did before. And even then, it was only because I found support." She replies. And then, that question. How well does she have a sense of touch? That gets a wry smile.
"...Mm. Well, not much better than you, I wager." Anita says. She unfolds her arms, running her right thumb across the surface her her metallic left hand. "It's like... if a surface is very hot, or very sharp, I can tell. Or if there's heavy pressure on it. Basically, if a surface is dangerous, I can tell, but... that's about it. I don't have anything finer than that."
Asciel draws out a remote, and with a click of the button, light is let in. She watches her swivel.
Her first time here... She listens - going back to the way it was...
"...It had an effect on you, didn't it. Something happened." Anita states. She doesn't press further, though - instead, she folds her arms in front of her and looks up, through the overhead shutters and up to the colony above.
"...Before, yeah. I grew up here. I had family, friends..." Anita starts. "But, well. You know."
She's quiet a moment longer.
"I can't say I've forgiven it, either." She admits.
<Pose Tracker> Asciel Colette has posed.
"Two years, hm..." Asciel repeats to herself, studying Anita's posture and gait. "...mm. So an adaptation period like that is relatively normal...ah. ...Don't mind me with that." It still feels strange to her, over a year in, inhabiting this shell, the strange feeling of over and underconnection. ...It's not one she even knows how to explain.
"Would it sound strange to say that...as far as "pain" is concerned...I often find damage to myself happening without my notice. But when I see it coming, I can't help but feel...yes. It's definitely pain. But it's rather useless if you have to be attentive to even feel it, right?"
A wry little laugh falls from Asciel's lips, and she clicks the triggers on the remote that would launch the fireworks from that Loto - of course, each one just triggers a blank fire, at least demonstrating to Anita it's unloaded at the moment.
It's almost more of a fidget about the painful topic of the atrocities of the past.
"Of course it affected me. Kh. Walking down here, watching everyone walk around, knowing so few of them have any bearing on that incident...I feel like I'm in a mockery of a graveyard! ...I can only imagine how it feels for you, with lives you know ripped away from you! Ghhh..." Asciel's left hand digs at her chest, bundling her overalls in a tight grip.
"It's probably unfair of me. Someone who had nothing to do with any of this, who wasn't anywhere near this colony, who didn't know anyone here, who was powerless to do anything about it, to still feel like...each person who died here hurts. ...I've never been able to explain it. All I know is...haaah. Not a day goes by where I don't burn to avenge your family and friends, you could say. Even though they are intangible, distant, unknowable to me. ...Greedy of me, I imagine...given they're yours to grieve instead of mine."
<Pose Tracker> Anita Rosetta has posed.
"Thereabouts, yeah." Anita confirms with a nod. "It depends on the person and circumstances, but..."
She trails off. Asciel says not to mind her, so Anita drops it and, instead, listens to what she has to say next. A slight frown crosses her lips out of concern.
"Well, not strange... Honestly, it's not uncommon for it to happen when people don't feel anything." Anita says. "But, uh - you gotta watch out for that. Take care of yourself, you know? Part of adjusting means... you do gotta be more attentive."
Asciel clicks the triggers on the remote, and the launchers blank fire. It's unloaded - that's good. Was that on purpose, or...?
A mockery of a graveyard... Anita frowns, just a little. She thinks back, to the way she felt, but listens as Asciel continues.
"...I can see how you'd feel that way, I guess." Anita says, tapping her fingers against her arm as she thinks her way through it. "It bothers me a bit to see everything changed so much, but... I don't know how I'd feel about it just being left to rust, either. And I know these people didn't have anything to do it, so it's hard for me to get mad at them."
It's complicated. Feelings are complicated.
"Still... I dunno if I'd call it unfair of you. Ten million people died. That's worth being angry about, even if you didn't know them. But, vengeance..." She frowns, just a little, massaging the back of her neck. "Me, I gave up on that a long time ago. The ones responsible are all dead, unknown, or went into hiding. It's exhausting, waging a war against ghosts."
She doesn't say she came to terms with it, of course. That's something different entirely.
<Pose Tracker> Asciel Colette has posed.
"As soon as I heard about it, I felt like I couldn't rest until a world where this happens wasn't possible anymore." A slow, measured, practiced type of smile crosses Asciel's face - the cheer of a performer. "Fighting ghosts? I can't settle for just 'the people who were responsible'. Because there will always be more. It will always happen again. Unless I put a stop to it."
A gentle cant of Asciel's head, staring directly into Anita's eyes - her own right closed as tightly as it can be. It should be comforting, but she over-corrects, and looks something like an owl. "Isn't it irresponsible? Having everyone continue to live in these vulnerable, fragile little bottles? What, exactly, has changed to stop this from ever happening again? In my eyes, absolutely nothing. ...Hah..."
"People tell me I'm going too far, but honestly...honestly...I...I think these colonies will always be at such risk of that kind of tragic fate...so...the only way to avert it is an end to the folly of making them in the first place...returning everyone to the lovely Earth..."
A long, weary sigh. "...well, thank you, at least, Anita, for not claiming it's nothing worth feeling anything about. ...Sometimes I wonder. ...tch. ...it was a pain so vast that it made me think of me as, well, "me", and to sometimes wonder that it's a mistake...hah."
...Momentarily, Asciel stiffens up, legs tightening over the edge of the Loto's treads, and asks hurriedly, "Is that when you had...whatever happened to you that made you need to graft the artificial onto yourself?!" -If it were the same day, the same event...then maybe, finally, this person-
<Pose Tracker> Anita Rosetta has posed.
Couldn't rest until a world where this happens isn't possible... Anita thinks of that for a bit, and that smile crossing Asciel's face. She doesn't smile back. Especially not when she's looking at her like that. Anita's eyes meet Asciel's.
"I can see how you'd think that. But... until recently, I've always lived in space. Yeah, it has its risks, but there's plenty of folks happier there than they'd ever be on Earth. You'd be moving a lot of people - a lot a lot of people. Some of 'em'd be happy about it, but I bet a lot of others wouldn't be." Anita replies. "Rather than moving the people... me, I just wanna be there to help them out, and be ready to move if anyone tries to do anything like this ever again."
She's in a position, now, to help. She wasn't before.
She nods, though, as Asciel thanks her.
"Sure, no problem." Anita replies with a shake of her head. "It'd be stranger if you didn't feel anything. I'd be real worried about anyone who heard about it and couldn't feel a thing."
She notices the way Asciel stiffens up, though - the sudden hurriedness to her voice, and Anita stands up straight, focusing on her just a little more. The way she almost seems rushed, as if she can't wait to get the question out... Anita considers it - and decides she might as well. She won't be the first one who hears the story. She probably won't be the last.
"Not directly, but, uh... it's related, I guess. My parents were a part of the protests, y'see. It was... a week before, maybe? Maybe two. I dunno. That time... it's all kind of a blur to me." She massages the back of her neck. "Suddenly, they told me to pack my things, and we left the colony on the shuttle along with some other folks. 'Cept... while we were out there, the Titans found us. Dunno if they were keeping track of people leaving the colony, or if it was just a stray patrol looking to let off some steam on some Spacenoids. And, well..."
She extends her right thumb and pointer finger into her gun, and mimes a shot.
"...That was that. I was the only one who survived, and I was hurt so badly they pretty much needed to rebuild me. And now I'm the woman you see before you today." She shrugs. "...By the time I first came to, after the surgery, it'd already happened. Everything was already gone."
Her home, and the friends and family left behind.
<Pose Tracker> Asciel Colette has posed.
Asciel soaks up that story in silence, attentive and upright, gripping the edge of her metallic seat. ...Looking for something in Anita's words. Gazing behind the veil, trying to see, trying to make sure...
Both of her hands clasp just below her neck, and her eyes close tightly.
...It's not something she's able to do, is it? That which would show empathy. Without proof of a single tear drop, can it really be shared?
A soft headshake in resignation. "...It must have been...profoundly difficult. I...you lost everything, and had no choice but to be remade that day...and I just don't think I understand."
"After everything that day did to you, taking away parts of you and demanding unmatched ones be added - how can you...how can you not-" Asciel pauses, shooting a glance back at the festively decorated core of the Loto - all its hatches open, its myriad internal seats empty, save for what Asciel already knows she's fated this machine to become inside there. "...We feel so different about it, clearly, despite our shared experiences. To tear you in half and graft something opposed onto yourself...I feel like a world that'd do that to you through violence and grief is unforgivable. ...But you go around...flaunting it, almost. Like you almost take pride in what it did to you."
"...hah. Hah...who am I to talk? ...of course I'm not one to denounce you for it."
Asciel's arms spread, half defiantly, half vulnerably, like a bird spreading its wings above Anita. "One look at me is the testament to the extreme measures I had to take. I can't just be ready to help if I see something on the horizon. Even my eye isn't all-seeing! It'll be too late to just put out fires when they start! So...I did this to myself, all trying to find a way to prevent it from happening to begin with. Because those ten million lives demanded I become something that could answer their dying wish, to never let them be an acceptable cost to uphold such a dangerous world! ...and I can't even manage to get someone like you to understand, huh. ...why am I the only one..."
<Pose Tracker> Anita Rosetta has posed.
"...It was." Anita confirms with a nod. She remembers the way she was before. The way she had been crushed, emotionally, barely able to put in the effort to survive. Pulling herself through that was the hardest thing she'd ever done.
But she listens quietly as Asciel continues, watching the way she glances toward the Loto's interior. She listens as she wonders. How?
It's a good question, honestly.
Asciel's arms spread wide defiantly, vulnerably, and Anita looks up at her. And ultimately... she can't help but feel sympathy for her. She was torn in half - but it's as if it's tearing her up inside, too.
"...Yeah. It's awful. Indescribably. To lose everything, everyone - it's crushing. It feels like you'll never be whole again, like a part of you was ripped out, and the hole it left can never be filled. Some people try to fill it different ways." She says, shaking her head. "...I didn't get through it alone. I found people - people that made me feel like a person again, who helped me through everything. Made me able to look at this,"
She raises her left hand again.
"And think of it as a part of myself, to be able to... take pride in it. To take that hurt and make it into something I could draw strength from. Made me believe in people again." She says, and shakes her head. "If I didn't have them... I don't know. Maybe I never would've recovered. Maybe I'd be where you are now. I dunno what you're planning... but maybe I'd even be helping you."
She shrugs.
"So... that's it, I guess." She draws to a close, and looks at Asciel. There's sympathy in her eyes. She might not be able to understand Asciel's way of thinking, but that pain is something she can sympathise with, at least. "...Did you have anyone, Asciel? Anyone to help you through it?"
<Pose Tracker> Asciel Colette has posed.
"...I have always had to do it all through my own will," Asciel says, purely and simply. "If I did not decide it, I would not be able to change the world, or myself. How could anyone possibly help, after all? Heh..." Weaving her fingers through the right side of her hair, Asciel concludes, with such misplaced pride, "Humans are not responsible for helping goddesses. It's the other way around. Perhaps I did not do it alone, but it was only through earning followers that I could triumph."
"...Any time I use that word, 'goddess', it seems like all of you have problems," she murmurs, kicking open a hatch on the Loto's tread unit with a noisy clang. "But becoming something like that is my only option. You get to still call yourself a 'human' despite what happened to you, Anita, despite how much of you was replaced. You still desired to be a person, as you were before. ...mn. ...I am used to what I want to become being refused and cherished in equal measure."
Sinking a small welding tool into the Loto's components for a moment, Asciel looks back up, gauging Anita carefully. "...say. ...If we enter a time where your humanity becomes refused because of what's changed with you...I'll accept you. As a fellow 'goddess'. ...at the moment, your company would only be myself and someone I can't stand, so it's not pleasant community, but it's something. Just something to think about, if you ever become spurned by human and inhuman alike~"
Asciel's clearly starting to return to multitasking throughout her slowly fading words to Anita...surely a plan involving an outdated tank repurposed to launch fireworks can't be that threatening...
<Pose Tracker> Anita Rosetta has posed.
...Always through her own will, huh. How could anyone possibly help... Anita considers that for a moment. Becoming a 'goddess' was her only option - gaining followers, rather than friends.
"That's... really sad, actually. I'm sorry." Anita apologises, massaging the back of her neck. It might not be the expected reaction.
The privilege of still being able to call herself 'human', though... that's fair. It's easier for her, who's always been flesh and blood.
"...I guess I can understand that much." Anita admits. And then Asciel looks up, studying her carefully. Anita looks back - and a rare expression of surprise crosses her face as Asciel gives her an offer. She considers it for a moment...
...And then, she nods.
"...Sure. If that day comes... then I'll find you again. I hope it doesn't get to that point, though." She replies. For her to get to that point...
It would likely mean that she had lost everything all over again.
She watches Asciel as she returns to work, and then briefly looks toward her machine. Fireworks... She frowns, curious.
"...Well, I'll get out of your hair, then." Anita says, taking a step back out of the warehouse. "Let you finish up your... project. You planning a parade?"
<Pose Tracker> Asciel Colette has posed.
Such a simple expression of empathy from Anita elicits such a long, frustrated sighing noise out of Asciel's throat-speaker. "I detest being pitied," is all Asciel insists about that isolating topic, before burying her face in repair work that so, so obviously takes more than herself to complete in any effective timespan.
"...It'd be concerning if you 'hoped' to become a goddess. Indeed, the desire to do so is often a grave flaw, among many humans carry. But I trust in your case, it would be in your most dire hour. ...saa," Asciel smiles to herself. "That'd be lovely. Someone begging for me for my curse because the world has truly spurned them...heeeeh..."
"I promise it'll be for a wonderful show, at the minimum. I wouldn't be working hard if I didn't find it most important to sing and perform for everyone. If you're still going to be here for it, I hope you enjoy it!~" That sing-songiness in Asciel's voice sending Anita off...
<Pose Tracker> Anita Rosetta has posed.
Anita shakes her head.
"It's not pity. Just... empathy." She replies. She's fine leaving it at that, though.
Indeed, it is concerning - and it seems Asciel understands, too, what it would take. Anita doesn't think she likes that smile.
And in the end - 'a wonderful show, at the minimum'. There's only one thing she can say to that. For better or worse...
"That so? Then I'll be there." Anita decides. "Good luck with your preparations."
With that, as Asciel sends her off, she turns to leave. She'll have to prepare herself, too.