2024-12-29: Encounters
- Log: 2024-12-29: Encounters
- Cast: Flay Allster, Lacus Clyne
- Where: Nouvelle Tokyo Station
- OOC - IC Date: December 29, 0099 (2024)
- Summary: Having searched for answers about her past, Lacus Clyne finds Flay Allster instead. Knowing they are connected by a multitude of encounters, Lacus decides to reveal to her a secret.
<Pose Tracker> Flay Allster has posed.
Though it isn't the territory of NUNE, Flay is spending the day in Japan. She'd been informed that a prototype Striker Pack picked up from Morgenroete years ago, the 'Integrated Weapons' pack had finally been cleared for use in live combat. But because many of NUNE's member nations had fallen on hard times due to the Break the World incident, Acataeon Industries outsourced the job to an OCU-based private company - in return for providing the blueprints to develop their own Strike variant.
If you asked Flay about it, she'd think it's all kind of shady... but that's not really what's important. She's just here because she had to sign off on the thing. And now that that's over with, she has the rest of the day to explore Nouvelle Tokyo on her own. She knows enough Japanese from Orb to get around... and she'd figure she would do some shopping while she's here.
And Flay can see why Nouvelle Tokyo is known for its rail system - it's very convenient to get around. By the time the sun starts to set, she has about two small bags full of miscellaneous clothing and skincare purchases, and she considers stopping somewhere quick to eat before heading back to the hotel she was provided.
But for now, there's no real rush - she's just waiting for the next train to show up. And it's not like she'd run into anyone she knows in the middle of Japan, right?
<Pose Tracker> Lacus Clyne has posed.
Lacus Clyne sits at the train station in Nouvelle Tokyo. Even with the OCU's withdrawal from the continuation of the Federation apparatus th at is NUNE, it's still one of the largest travel hubs in the world. Another round of house-searching down (she feels bad about still imposing on Murrue for this long)... she could go anywhere at all in the world from here.
Her eyes track over toward an employee access door. Her thoughts track into the past, toward intelligence, toward...
... her own origins.
She's interrupted, however, by a familiar face. One she wasn't expecting -- and one she last saw in battle. For a few moments, she considers whether to even say anything; surely Flay has other places to be -- and approaching a woman who once used you as a hostage is an awkward thing indeed.
Flay almost certainly feels that gaze on her well before she's approached -- but she is indeed approached, by a Lacus Clyne wearing a surplus Zeon Earth Attack Corps jacket over a sleeveless turtleneck and khaki pants.
"Miss Allster," she says, voice soft but preternaturally clear even here in a crowded train station, in a way that's difficult to ignore.
"... It's been some time."
<Pose Tracker> Flay Allster has posed.
Truthfully, Flay has a lot on her mind herself. The shopping trip helped keep her mind off things for a while, but even then, it only accentuated how aimless she feels right now. As if it's just one small thing from her old life she can cling to. Lacus may have a purpose, here, anywhere... but Flay can't really say she does beyond being the Gaia Sabers' poster girl.
That, too, is interrupted - by a certain presence. That, too, Flay tries to ignore at first, but she finds that it's impossible, or maybe inevitable. "...Oh. It's you," She starts, her voice flat. "Lacus Clyne." And it's almost as if she came to that realization before seeing that flash of pink hair before her. She wordlessly checks the time on her phone before taking a single step closer.
"Hasn't it," She agrees, that it's been some time. Encountering her in a mobile suit was one thing, with all the degrees of separation it offers. But the last time she saw Lacus's face in person was as her hostage... and it's because of that, she's the person she experienced the worst moment of her life with. And the feelings surrounding that can only be complicated.
"There's so many things I want to say to you," She starts, clutching the sleeve of her own purple jacket. Like what she's doing here, why she and the Freedom were involved with the wedding in Orb... and more than that, how Kira's doing. "But I'll give you one thing first." She takes a deep breath.
"...I'm sorry. For the way I treated you back then." And she looks back up, as if expecting something. The next train has already passed, but well... she already wasn't in a hurry. "Why did you approach me? I thought you'd want nothing to do with someone like me."
<Pose Tracker> Lacus Clyne has posed.
The swirl of negative emotions around Flay -- around seeing Lacus, at that -- isn't lost on the Coordinator(?), certainly not here and now. The flatness, too -- from a woman who wore her heart on her sleeve when Lacus knew her that's a little jarring to boot.
When Flay says she wants to say many things to her -- that startles her. After her other experiences since her world once more began to turn, she's expecting something entirely different, though. Her eyes widen slightly at the apology, though she quickly returns to a more neutral expression of her own.
"... Circumstances can turn many people into something they aren't," Lacus muses aloud. "This era is a complicated one..." One wonders if any era of human history hasn't faced such complications.
When she's asked why she approached, Lacus genuinely has to think. Her brow furrows, and her eyes turn just a bit toward the sky. "Why would you think that? Regardless of the circumstances, my life has changed yours and yours has changed mine. Is that not reason enough for us to have another life-changing encounter?" ... Something about the pretension gets her to stop and giggle at herself. It doesn't last, though, and her expression subtly flattens out.
Two Haro Minis roll out from behind her into Flay's field of view, bouncing up and down a little; the familiar pink Haro offers an, "I won't accept that!" and promptly gets gently headbutted (body-checked???) by a yellow one.
Lacus... seems embarrassed, for a moment; she then revises her statement a bit. "... I thought there might be a reason we would encounter each other here," she admits. "Are you looking for information on the coup last year?" She blinks, realizing, "... Almost two, now, I think."
The what.
<Pose Tracker> Flay Allster has posed.
Flay isn't sure the words Lacus expected from her, nor does she know Lacus well enough to have any idea how she'll react to her apology. Flay listens, nervously, to Lacus's response... and it sounds like she accepts it. So she relaxes a little, releases some of that tension. "...In times like these, it's easy to get swept up in it, isn't it?" She shakes her head. And though she doesn't bring it up, Flay remembers hearing about Siegel Clyne's death a few years ago.
The answer Lacus gives to Flay's question, too, is curious. A life-changing encounter... "But all I ever did was hurt you - and the person precious to you," and maybe that too, is a pretension. All the same, she continues. "If you're expecting me to change your life for the better, you have a very strange way of thinking." And despite her words, her tone certainly has a lot more life in it now than it did at the start of their encounter.
"...Still, I'm a little glad you did," She admits, then, with a brush through her red hair. "After the wedding, I never thought I'd get the chance to speak honestly with you." And as she concludes that line of thought--
Haro!
Two of them! Flay certainly remembers Mr. Pink for all the trouble he caused aboard the Archangel - and as he's body checked by the yellow one, she just manages to catch him "You have more of them?" Flay asks, with a mildly bewildered expression that turns into a small, but genuine smile without her even noticing it - as she hands Mr. Pink back over to Lacus. Right. Lacus may be a Coordinator (?), but she's an ordinary girl just like her at the end of the day.
But a reason they would encounter each other... "Maybe there isn't a reason to it, unless we give it one," Flay suggests, with a light shrug. She was here on business, but she doubts it would have anything to do with Lacus. So she lets it slide, until Lacus brings up a coup.
"...A coup? You mean how the OCU split from the Federation?" She squints. She really has no idea. Even if it did make the news, a minor coup in Japan wouldn't hold enough importance for her to look into it. "You're from PLANT. Why would you care about something like that?"
<Pose Tracker> Lacus Clyne has posed.
They're alike in that way, too, aren't they? Perhaps Lacus has more to learn from Flay than she realized; after all, even if she may have done so imperfectly -- she has at least seized forward movement in a way Lacus herself has struggled to. Is there nothing to learn from that?
If there isn't, surely it's because Lacus isn't trying to learn.
"... That's true, perhaps," Lacus reflects. "But it only has to remain true if that were to be the last time we ever met." She brings a finger under her lips, subtly pressing lower toward upper. She takes a few steps closer to Flay, if cautiously. "Even then, perhaps the encounters those encounters led to will change our lives for the better in turn. How can we know, if we cease to have them? As long as we're alive, 'tomorrow' is something we choose for ourselves."
Her soliloquy gets grounded in the moment. "... I'm quite glad to have encountered you since then as well. I hope you've given my question some thought."
Is Flay happy?
Is Lacus happy?
... Haros!!
Lacus gives Flay a smile that edges toward smirk. "Yes," she says, before reaching down to the front pocket of her carry-on. She unzips it.
Five more Haro Minis come out. Today, the yellow one has had a lion face drawn on its lower plate, now visible as it tilts upward toward Flay, and the black one is ringed with ornate gold filigree.
And now all of them are bouncing around Flay.
Accepting Mr. Pink again, Lacus agrees, "That may be so," before turning her attention to the topic she herself brought up.
"... No, there was an attempt by Ravnui's foreign office to support a coup within OCU Japan," Lacus says, eyes slightly wider as she realizes Flay... knows nothing. Well, it makes sense -- she's a relatively recently-minted officer, and the OCU is out of her jurisdiction besides.
"Ravnui was Mendel Colony's Earth national sponsor... and the projects that Ravnui attempted to use to foment the coup are..." She trails off for a moment. How much does Flay truly know about Kira? Is this her story to tell?
... well, it is also her story.
"... Mendel Colony's research is responsible for Kira's unique Coordination process -- and mine." There's a melancholy in her expression, as her eyes fail to meet Flay's. "I thought that if I came here, I would understand things a little better... but the trip has left me with more questions than answers."
Encounters-on-encounters... Mendel Colony touched her and Kira, and so too does it touch Flay. Perhaps that's all the reason there needs to be for Flay to learn this, too. Still... the way Lacus brings one hand over to her opposite elbow, looking as if she's at a loss for an explanation she nevertheless feels obligated to give...
<Pose Tracker> Flay Allster has posed.
It might be difficult, for Flay to ever imagine such inner turmoil from Lacus. After all, she always seems so perfectly composed. So assured that the path she's taking is the correct one. Then again, sometimes it takes making some mistakes to truly move forward... and Flay has made many of them along her own path.
But in the moment, she listens to Lacus's soliloquy about encounters. She doesn't move as Lacus cautiously steps over, but she does fidget with her bags a little. "If we never had such difficult encounters, nothing would ever change... is that what you're saying?" She tilts her head. "And if we were the same people we were three years ago... we could never have a conversation like this. In a way, I guess that proves your point."
Lacus says, she too, is glad to meet her again... and that gets Flay's expression to soften, before the mention of the question she left her with turns her blue eyes more contemplative. "I have," Flay answers. "And honestly? I still don't have an answer," Her eyes meet Lacus's, slowly. "But I felt that if the world keeps changing like this... then I'll do everything I can to make sure it doesn't leave me behind." She is just a Natural after all. But she does wonder - if she had everything Lacus does, would it really make her happy?
Though before she dives too deep into it -- Haro attack!! "...Oh geez," Her smile, maybe begrudgingly, grows a little wider, watching them all bounce around. "They are kind of cute. Where did you get this many of them, anyway?"
But when Lacus begins to talk about the Ravnui coup, she begins to inadvertently answer the question that was just on Flay's mind. And before she can even begin to question the politics behind a nominally neutral European nation with a strange research colony attempting a coup in Japan, something else clicks - and it starts to feel like her head is spinning.
"Hang on! What's Kira have to do with this? He's from Earth, right? His parents were waiting to see him when the Archangel docked in Orb, but he refused to see them because-" Because he pitied her? That's what she believed this entire time. It's only now beginning to set in that maybe he had his own reasons for not wanting to see them. "That's... I had no idea." Her dark red bangs flop over her eyes.
A unique Coordination process, developed in secret on Mendel Colony... of which some of its products attempted to reshape the course of the world. Flay doesn't think Lacus would lie about this. She has no reason to, especially if she's also revealing her own secret. But she takes a step back, overwhelmed by the new information. In truth, it doesn't change the way she feels about Kira. It doesn't even change the way she feels about Lacus. But it does recontextualize a lot.
"Then you're not just a Coordinator... is that what you mean?" Flay could ask why Lacus chose to tell her all this... but she will simply have to live with the consequences of knowledge. "I don't think I'll be of any help in finding those answers. But if you're telling me the truth, then... your secrets are safe with me." Flay promises - really, it's the least she can offer when Lacus trusted her with not just her own secret, but also Kira's.
"As long as you promise me one thing." She adds, her tone not quite aggressive, but a touch more harsh. "Just.. don't drag Kira into this."
<Pose Tracker> Lacus Clyne has posed.
No human moves forward without interruption forever; such is the realm of fantasy. Still -- that Flay takes Lacus's words to heart, considers them, and agrees that the two of them have changed... it shows that if nothing else Lacus has not stagnated so much as she thought. Even if it feels as though Flay may still be ruled by ghosts -- their grip on her is not iron, at least.
So the answer hasn't changed much... and the more Lacus thinks about it, here and now, the more interesting it is, the more challenging it is. Has the world left Lacus behind, then? Has her own worry about grabbing the reins of her life being no different than putting the world itself in a chokehold overtaken her?
... If that were true, Lacus herself would be pitiable indeed -- but the fact that she was in Japan looking for a new place to live lets her put that aside for now. She is moving forward, at least. "I think you've taken steps to ensure that it doesn't," she agrees, before letting the melancholy drop. ... Still, it does seem to gnaw at her.
There's easier things to talk about, anyway. "Almost all of my Haros were gifts from Athrun Zala, when we initially met. I... did try to build one of my own from a Mini upgrade kit I found online, but that's not where my talents lie..." She seems a little embarrassed by the image of Lacus Clyne accidentally losing grip on a flathead screwdriver and gashing herself across the finger.
It's hard to escape the melancholy, even as the two of them slowly walk the station and speak. In the end, it draws them back in -- as Flay agrees to keep Lacus's secret... at least, until she leverages a promise out of her.
Lacus's stomach lurches, and it's impossible to miss despite her composed demeanor -- something about that request drives to the heart of many of her worst anxieties. ... Her eyes turn to Flay again, and back to the things she knows of Kira's past. She knows exactly why Flay would request it --
-- and wonders why one of the things that makes part of her see Flay as so pitiful now feels so close to home.
"... I promise," she says, and it feels poisonous on her tongue. It's not that it's insincere -- but does a promise not to invite the wolf matter at all when you know your every breath smells like blood all on its own?
Nevertheless -- she gives it, because whatever else is true, she certainly would like it if she added no more to Kira's struggles.
Eager for any off-ramp, Lacus asks, "... If you aren't in a hurry for the train, would you like to go to Starbows?" instead. The Haros briefly congregate between Lacus and Flay -- and then split their number, half moving behind Lacus and half behind Flay, instead.
<Pose Tracker> Flay Allster has posed.
Whether either of them can say they're truly happy, both Lacus and Flay have proven to each other that they're taking the steps to move forward. They're both here at this train station because their lives go on - and as another person might say, the hardest battle is to keep on living.
Pity was never the driving emotion that Flay felt for Lacus - it might be closer to envy. But neither is a really healthy way to look at another person in their entirety, and while it's difficult for such feelings to truly go away, it slowly begins to fade as Flay really gets to know Lacus. "That's all you can do, isn't it? Even if it feels like a constant battle to keep up." She agrees, about taking steps.
Though Flay finds it a little easier to talk about the Haros, too. She knows Athrun was Lacus's former fiance, but clearly, his handiwork is still important to her. "I can tell a lot of care was put into them, but I wonder just which one of you programmed them to be so mean," she remarks with a slight smirk, pointing at Mr. Pink.
It doesn't escape Flay's notice though, that it's difficult for Lacus to keep her mind off what she just told her. That even when the topic switches back to something as simple and lighthearted as building Haros, there's a certain melancholy encircling it. When Lacus turns to face her again, Flay meets her in the eyes this time - as if they are a mirror.
Flay is aware that what she requested of Lacus is both selfless and selfish at the same time. To her, it's a small way of making up for what she did by ensuring that Kira continues to live a peaceful life. And in doing so, she inflicted the same anxiety onto Lacus, whether that's fair or not. "...Thank you," She nods, slowly - willing to place her trust in Lacus for once.
And she's content to leave it there, when Lacus suggests Starbows. "I'd like that," Flay nods. While she'd like to check in the hotel by 10 PM, she still has more than enough time to kill. She notices too, that the Haro are starting to like her... "I was hoping to get something to drink after all this walking around, anyway." She adds, before delving into chatter about drink orders.
It's not the encounter she was expecting. But in a way, it was life-changing.