2022-10-16: GUTSy Question and Answer

• Log: 2022-10-16- GUTSy Question and Answer
• Cast: Milly Ashford, Guy Shishioh
• Where: Nouvelle Tokyo - Ramen Shop
• OOC - IC Date: 0096-10-16
• Summary: After noticing something seriously weird about GUTS's updating class rosters, Milly decides to poke at their emergency contacts -- and ends up having ramen with the Chief of 3G Green.

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<Pose Tracker> Milly Ashford has posed.

After following up on several class transfers and a new teacher addition -- none of which really passes the Milly Ashford Smell Test the more she looks at them -- Milly has found out that all roads lead to NERV, 3G, or some combination thereof. So it goes that following up on everything goes to one place: Guy Shishioh's office.

So apparently, Milly Ashford has stumbled onto something!

She suggests a traditional Japanese restaurant in Nouvelle Tokyo as a sit-down, because apparently this situation is just a liiiiiiiittle too complex for a phone conversation. (The idea that 'class transfers' are 'a phone security issue' is a little unnerving for her, if she's being honest...)

... but it also means fresh ramen, so there's that. Milly is, of course, right on time -- and takes a seat after giving her order to a cute young lady with brown hair and green eyes. She has a messenger bag with her, with a folio full of GUTS-related paperwork; she sets that on the table. She isn't sure Guy will need it, but hey -- it never hurts to be prepared.

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

Guy Shishioh is only a few moments later. These days he spends a lot of time in some variation on his 3G uniform, and given the nature of the call, this one's no exception; he's put on the gold vest he uses to look a little less imposing than the long black Chief's coat he wears on full duty, these days, but the underlying jumpsuit is the same. In the old days stuff like this might get handled by Mikoto or Swan, but given the circumstances, he wanted to touch base on this one personally rather than leave it to Hana. He's invested, now.

Also it might end up with Tamara or Ayame and those are both terrifying thoughts.

The man once known as Humanity's Strongest Cyborg steps in, spots Milly off in a booth, and gets his hero grin on as he moves to join her. He offers a hand for a shake before sitting. "Miss Ashford, I take it? Guy Shishioh. Sorry to ask you to come all this way."

<Pose Tracker> Milly Ashford has posed.

Milly accepts the handshake; her grip is firm but not crushing, and she seems... well, like -- despite being a high schooler on a slightly janky schedule (it's normal in the Universal Century -- sometimes high school ends at 15, sometimes it extends to 20. Weirdnesses abound!) -- she's pretty comfortable in the world of adults, or at least getting there.

"Milly Ashford," she says, with a nod. "You can call me Milly, though," she adds, with a wink. ... it's hard to tell if she's flirting or if she's just Like This, and the half-smile, half-smirk on her face offers no obvious signposts.

Fortunately, if it is flirting she's sure not dwelling there. "I actually like getting a chance to see the other side of the border! GUTS is good for that," she says. "So, here's what I have." She takes a second to compose her thoughts, and then:

"So the first student transfer -- Jindai 1 to Tsutsujidai 2 -- wasn't that strange, especially since she'd been at the Deculture Festival with Team Tsutsujidai. I thought she might have just preferred the energy there. Now I've got... three or four transfers? And all of them are landing in the same class in Tsutsujidai, even though getting the classrooms to the same size was a goal for them at the start of the year."

Milly's blue eyes convey a little more seriousness at this point, as she says, "And all of them -- and the new teacher -- have links to NERV. Now, if this is some sort of operation I'm not going to say anything, but it doesn't seem organized enough for that."

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

Guy's own grip is a bit cautious - firm, but necessarily erring gentle, because his full grip strength can bend steel, let alone a schoolgirl's precious bones.

Guy has a girlfriend he's working on de-gooping so he takes the wink with a neutral grin. Just a bit like Swan, he thinks.

Pleasantries complete, he seats himself, and listens.

Yep, that's sure what he thought. When their sever wanders by, he orders a water and a ramen of his own, and then turns his attention to Milly with Business completed.

"I guess you could call it an operation, but it's not one of ours. You're correct, this isn't a natural phenomenon. There's a..." He hesitates on the word. Kaiju smith? Science Criminal? "...hostile actor," he decides, "that we've been coordinating against in the Tsutsujidai area, and we believe she's trying a new strategy. Most likely kaiju-based, judging from previous incidents."

<Pose Tracker> Milly Ashford has posed.

"Hm." Milly frowns a little at that; the idea that there's a hostile actor with a specific interest not just in a GUTS school, but in the host of one of GUTS's next two events and in a specific class, is a little dire for her.

"Hmm... I'm guessing it's related to the mecha-kaiju that showed up at the Tsutsujidai kickoff for the Deculture Festival, too," Milly says, putting two and two together from that. She can't really do a lot about that unless she decides to go tearing off in the Ganymede, which:

No.

"I don't want my classmates getting hurt," she says, deciding to just be direct about it. "Do you think this new strategy is going to get them hurt? If all it's doing is making them transfer schools, that's..."

Water arrives. Milly takes a sip. "... hm."

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

"It is," Guy says, regarding the connection to the Deculture Festival, because GGG is no longer a secret organization and he believes safety information should be as public as he can get it.

So, her next question earns her a shake of the head. "The phenomenon itself is not immediately harmful. We're still exploring the effects but it seems to be most similar to a sort of...weaponized depression. A loss of will, a desire to give up before the scale of the world. Then they move to a peaceful little town where everything's perfect."

He flicks his fingers upward in an open-palm motion, a slightly wry signal that he thinks the logic doesn't hold up. "Is the theory. A mental state like that can have detrimental long-term effects, I'm sure you know even better than me. But so far we haven't seen anything we feel needs emergency intervention."

"I guess the short answer, then, is no, I don't think it will get them hurt. There's likely to be another kaiju fight at some point soon, maybe there, when we find the actual source of all this. But I don't expect violence involving the victims."

<Pose Tracker> Milly Ashford has posed.

Weaponized depression, and a peaceful little town where everything's perfect... given Milly got some weird looks when bringing up the kaiju attack from Tsutsujidai students during the Festival, Milly's starting to draw the shape of Tsutsujidai's strangenesses, bit by bit.

"Mhm." Milly plucks her straw from her drink, absently twirling it in her hands, then gesturing with it. Guy isn't the only one who needs to keep his hands moving. "It sounds like the best thing I can do is just keep your friends from going crazy," she offers, matter-of-factly... though something gnaws at her about that answer, and --

"If someone did the same thing and there wasn't a kaiju involved," Milly asks, "what would you suggest they do?"

She tells herself she's asking for Emilia's sake.

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

"Considering what they've been doing on our side, it's best you not intervene officially. They're avoiding real violence, but they might make themselves a nuisance," Guy says, reaching for his own drink.

"...unofficially," Guy says, eyes sweeping up toward Milly, "our recommendations are to make efforts to treat them well. They're a bit troubled right now, but we believe they're expressing anxieties they do normally have. It's less like brainwashing and more--"

...............

It's not like brainwashing, he'd said to any number of people, explaining the effects of Triple 0 on his friends.

Ah.

That's why this is bugging him.

He takes a sudden deep breath, hand coming up to pinch his nose from the strain of composure. Focus, Guy, this is a civilian, she doesn't need to know.

"Sorry. Nothing to worry about," He chuckles, passing it off, and folds his hands around his glass. "It's less like brainwashing and more like they've had their priorities forcefully changed," he says, completing his sentence. "That being the case, attempting to address those anxieties, and show that you care, should be helpful in the longrun. We believe that it's being enforced from outside, though, which does mean you might not get immediate results."

He thinks back. Wait was that what she was asking? Making that connection threw him off.

<Pose Tracker> Milly Ashford has posed.

Milly's always been very attentive; it's partially because she just finds other people interesting and likes to know how they tick, but also a little bit of her family's insistence on her being a very good conversationalist. When Guy stops dead mid-sentence on 'less like brainwashing,' her eyes narrow slightly and she gives him a look.

'Nothing to worry about,' he says.

"Nothing to worry about... sounds like it must be a common occupational hazard, then!" Milly says, chucking a harpoon into the water and seeing what she fishes up.

Ramen arrives. Milly decides now would be a great time to put ramen in her mouth. And slurp. It's not rude to slurp when it's Japanese food, right?

Eventually, she says, "That's definitely helpful, though. I'll see what I can do. Just to be sure -- it's Ohta, Shikinami, Pommier, and Nagisa so far, right?"

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

She hits several barely-processed traumas right on the broadside, but he's recently worked on some of them, so Guy manages to recover to a smile. "More than I'd like to admit. A lot of fighting science threats is about putting thoughts together in a hurry."

Still, he eats, too. He spent some very formative years not able to properly process food and now tries to make up for it as often as he can.

When she does break silence again, he nods to the question, then actually thinks about it and spots several interesting points. "Wow, they're fast. We only got warning about Shikinami's departure a few hours ago. Must be filing papers in a hurry. Oh, and the Nagisa is just O. K's unrelated to it." ...but the fact he knows about K. Nagisa probably gives something away, not that being enrolled in two schools isn't already a red flag. "And there's one another, but--"

He tips his head. "Actually, interesting that she hasn't done anything to get on your desk. "Cardiff."

Akane wasn't bluffing about not using them as a brainwashed army, but if she's got everyone else enrolling in school, what's Renais up to?

<Pose Tracker> Milly Ashford has posed.

"I run a tight ship," Milly says, smiling. "You'd be surprised how much people get motivated by a little shouting and the threat of a rolled up newspaper! I don't let anyone get away with slacking off."

The fact that Kaworu -- despite sharing a previous school with Shikinami and a surname with Ouka -- is unrelated to both, though... that is weird. Then again: "I thought about that for a little bit, but he didn't transfer to second year and did it a lot earlier, so I'd figured that was the case." Her lips pout out slightly, and she adds, "I appreciate the confirmation, though."

Cardiff... that one's interesting too. "Do you want me to see what I can dig up?" Milly asks. "If she's not a teacher or a student transfer I wouldn't have spotted something right away. However," slight tone shift, "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence."

Her ramen is still hot and she wants to eat it while it is, so: ramen time!

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

Oh, it's not that he's unrelated. He's super related. He's just not related to this incident. ...or to Ouka, other than professionally. Guy really should have a talk with him, come to think of it.

"Hah. So that's your style?" he muses, swirling his ramen. "Sounds like a few people I know, yeah." Shigeru hearing the newspaper thing must never happen.

Discussion of Kaworu, he decides not to correct - she doesn't need to know unless she needs contacts up there and he is not QUITE reckless enough to *encourage* that behavior. Now if it becomes obvious she's gonna do it anyway that's another matter.

He hesitates a moment to ask her to investigate. That's what 3G intelligence is for. But they're spread thin, and...and it's his cousin they're talking about now. "Yeah, please." he says. "You're exactly right. Given the rest of the pattern, it'd be strange if she's not involved somewhere."

He too returns to noodle time. It's not exactly Boss Ramen, but that's setting the bar way too high, after all.

<Pose Tracker> Milly Ashford has posed.

Milly has never had truly excellent ramen; by the time she started dipping her toes into Japanese food, Area 11's cuisine had already started undergoing gentle Britannification, so authentic ramen with high depth of flavor is a little bit beyond her. "I don't think GUTS would've worked out as an initiative if it wasn't," Milly says, and for a moment she's relieved to feel like a teenager and not someone dealing with kaiju problems.

Milly pulls out her phone at the mention of investigating. "I won't get myself in too much trouble, but I can at least review our adult whitelist," she says, making the assumption that Renais -- as a 3G-related person of some sort -- is an adult. She scrolls with her thumb with one hand, using her chopsticks with the other. (Her technique is low-mid.)

"I'm relieved to hear someone's doing something about this," Milly notes, as she flips through... then tabs to her Student Council email.

"... I do have a whitelist request for a Cardiff," Milly says. "Cute glasses. It says she's... coaching swimming?"

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

Not a perfect assumption, that any GGG staff are adults, but Akane already Got the main ongoing exception.

Guy eats quietly while she works, waiting. Just a little worry creeping into him. Fending off that Angel worked off some nerves for him, but in the end, worry for his friends is a part of his nature he could never shake. He wouldn't want to try.

"Swimming?" he asks, visibly surprised by that one. "With her condition? That...." He quirks his lips. "...seems like a logistical challenge. Alright. I guess that at least accounts for everyone."

He works the noodles thoughtfully. "Bringing absolutely everyone to the school, huh," he murmurs. "And her own class, at that. Says a lot about her mindset, I guess."

He starts a little, remembering his company. "Ah, sorry, obviously you don't need to worry about all that. Thank you very much for confirming that for me, it was a big help."

<Pose Tracker> Milly Ashford has posed.

Milly mentally earmarks that last comment -- the implication that the hostile actor is someone in class 2-E -- but decides it's best not to touch it. Yuta and Rikka had had such serious things to say about Tsutsujidai during the Cosplay Pageant... and while at the time she'd written them off as the dramatics of childhood, she thinks she has a slightly fuller picture now.

... Everyone's battles are their own. If they need Milly, they'll have her. If they don't need her, there are plenty of things only Milly can do.

With another slurp, she says, "Thank you for confirming I wasn't jumping at shadows," giving him a smile. "Oh, and do you want me to cover this or is this going in the 3G expense account? I don't mind handling it, but I also don't mind kicking the bill elsewhere~"

<Pose Tracker> Guy Shishioh has posed.

He'd tried to keep that out of it - he referred specifically to the hostile just being in Tsutsujidai's region, before - but doesn't even notice he slipped this time. This is why GGG normally pays other people for these conversations.

"I'm glad you contacted us," Guy says, matching that smile with his own grin. "It's reassuring to know the folks running GUTS are the type who'll chase down something fishy."

She catches him on the followup with noodles halfway to his face. He laughs at that. "I'll cover it. Least I can do for your help."

<Pose Tracker> Milly Ashford has posed.

"Perfect!" Milly enthuses. Her smile turns a touch more devious as she notes, "In that case, I'm going for seconds."

The conversation doesn't stop there, but it does become less of a Project; Milly's a little curious about what working for NERV is like, because... she's a bright kid with a future rapidly approaching!