2022-11-14: Madder

• Log: 2022-11-14- Madder
• Cast: Lucine Azul, Akane Shinjo
• Where: Tsutsujidai
• OOC - IC Date: 0096-11-14
• Summary: Lucine Azul comes and leaves a note for Liam. Liam's new friend takes notice.

---

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        Lucine needs to communicate with Liam somehow, but in a way that would not upset the balance of cognitive denial and masking that seems to gild the reasons for people coming here.

        Dressed in her impeccable disguise of '1 beret (may or may not be raspberry colored)', '1 pair of fake thick rimmed glasses', that's been added onto with a white jacket and her dark teal hair pinned back in a curly bun, Lucine looks like.... Lucine, trying a new look. It's not as if a person can fool a god on a budget, but with luck, Akane may not know her from.... well, someone other than Adam. They've never had direct contact before.

        This may have been her first mistake.

        A letter is dropped into Liam's shoe cubbie at the school, with a noticeably different envelope than the one he had left behind in the hospital. Inside, would be a simple note.

        This may have been her second mistake.

        Now, for the retreat back, away from the school, tugging close the duffle bag against her shoulder. She'll just change back into her flight suit in one of the public bathrooms near the park and fly away. Easy peasy. Nothing could go wrong.

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

The letter, at least, goes untouched -- but it does get noticed. Akane is back to her mild-to-moderate delinquency habits, which means skipping -- which means she catches a glimpse of Lucine as she drops a letter in Liam's shoe locker. It's a classic...

... but from someone from outside the school? That bears a little investigation. Akane gives her a fifteen second head start, and then...

It's about two hundred feet from the school that Akane finally raises her voice. "Guessing you came to wish Liam well?" she asks. What may come as a surprise is that -- despite having shadowed Lucine this far -- Akane doesn't have a lot of malevolent intent yet... her whole affect is honestly pretty subdued. ... something's off about it, though. She doesn't feel the way a human feels.

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        Lucine can't argue that there isn't a certain discreet thrill in doing something so often visited in shoujo manga, even if the circumstances bring her quickly back to sobriety.

        Fifteen seconds, and it starts: that presence, coming closer. Her pace quickens, but still continues to be as casual as Lucine can manage.

        'Guessing you came to wish Liam well?'

        "...." Lucine stops, taking in a deep breath and letting it pass through her mouth. It's definitely surprising to Lucine that Akane chose to approach her so amiably.

        If only it felt that way to her other senses, instead of making her feel paranoid.

        Lucine turns, pressing the thick rims of her glasses up the bridge of her nose. ".... Yes." This is Akane, no doubt. Even if Lucine didn't know her from the small glimpses during the battle in Paris, or from other media.

        As for the letter, it's the truth; the note is in Lucine's handwriting, telling him to be safe, keep well, and that they'll meet again soon.

        "...."

        She should say something.

        "..."

        Say something.

        "... Why Liam."

        This is a mistake.

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

There's something tense in Akane's posture -- mirrored in her emotional landscape, like a starved beast -- as Lucine stands there for several seconds, trying to sort through what she's even going to say. Akane has no problem waiting, her head canting just slightly to one side, a hand resting on a hip in faint impatience.

'Why Liam.'

"Hm! That's a question, isn't it," she answers, taking another step forward. "He's been screwed up pretty bad since everything that happened in France. And like who's gonna blame him, right? That whole thing was horrible." 'High Tension...' Akane still thinks about that one, sometimes.

"Plus, before that brief little run of me working with BioNet, I asked him if he'd like my protection. Guess now that I'm back to not working with them, he figured that was still on the table." All smiles, she affirms: "I can be pretty forgiving~"

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        "....."

        Kaworu's recent phone conversation still runs through Lucine's head. Akane's not emotional honest with others, or herself. It's okay to walk away.

        Then Ryoko comes up, urging Lucine to punch back. She was half drunk, just like Lucine half suspected she herself was, until she realized she had been drinking Minmays.

        ".... It was horrible, yes. I was there." Akane takes a step forward, and this time, Lucine mirrors it with a step back. "And this is the environment for him? Was the wig your idea?" The question comes out like an accusation before Lucine could stop herself, throwing one point in Ryoko's favor. "What do you plan to do with him? With everyone that you've had come here?"

        Walk away. Walk away. This is not an Angel battle.

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

"Yeah." It's about the wig. "Usually people around here don't look twice, but like... they still look," Akane points out. Nails that stick up get hammered down -- and as Tsutsujidai becomes less and less 'her space,' it becomes more and more important to protect her... subjects... from that kind of looking.

Lucine takes a step back, and Akane considers whether to pursue. ... in the end, she does; if it were just her she'd be inclined to walk away, but then -- it's not just her anymore, is it? After months, she's much closer to having her paradise to herself again than she's ever been.

"I don't mind having them stick around, but in the long term? Their own little worlds. They deserve a break from the loneliness outside just as much as anyone else, right?" ... She thinks back to her conversation with Alouette -- back to Alouette turning that exact thing down, even now that she and Akane finally understand each other in full.

... it's a blip. It won't take any of them long to realize that that's what's best, even if they fight it at first.

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        She should walk away right now. That would be the right, safe thing to do.

        ".... So there's been no change from your original plan. Separate everyone into their own individual worlds, alone. The Chaos Bringer effect...."

        Liam, alone, in a set piece. Asuka, the Princess of EVA pilots, alone. Several others, alone, in a world made just for them. A prison, never changing.

        A artifical world where the flowers never bloom.

        A world that 'plays it safe'.

        The caution in Lucine's eyes simmers, boils. Breaks into all the bits of anger she's ever felt.

        ".... That isn't a break. That's _forever_. They'll be alone, forever...." Lucine's fingers curl into tight fists, her arms held straight to her sides. Her words come a quiet, shuddering whisper, steadily growing in volume. ".... You wish to do something on the same level as the utter *shit* BioNet put Liam through..."

        An index finger is raised and pointed straight at Akane's face, the speed of the action jolting the white fabric of her wildbreaker. "Is that a world you want to wish on the people you care about? To have them in a place where you can never hear their voice or tell them how much you mean to them? No sharing stories, no holding them, no comforting them when they're sad."

         "No just existing in the world, knowing they're in the world together with you?! To be alone is not a terrible thing, but for it to be forced on you by someone else... how can you think you can make that choice for everyone?!?"

         Her voice is no longer a whisper. It's a shout.

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

This is actually the first time Akane's heard 'Chaos Bringer,' and she's now quite curious... but it seems pretty secondary. "Huh? No, did you not listen? This is the opposite of that. It's not like that kind of world's empty! Haven't you met Yu --"

That thrust index finger cuts her off, and the anger rolling off Lucine surprises her -- but it's not that it's anger that catches her so off guard. It's why.

Those bright red eyes blink. "You've got messed up priorities. No one out there really cares about anyone else. Like... what do you think is gonna happen when those Crucible guys decide they want Liam back? What about when they get him? You think they're going to be satisfied by anything less than turning him into some broken husk that starts screaming crazy stuff and then dies?"

Another step forward, as Lucine keeps shouting. "Ooh. You're pretty selfish and cruel yourself." After a moment's thought, she appends, leaning even closer, "Besides. Sooner or later, you'll be too inconvenient to each other and one of you'll ditch. Maybe not right now, but in like, a year? Three? He'll make some choice you can't handle, and then, boom. You're worse off than when you started. Better to dodge the bullet, right?"

This, too, is a misshapen, inhuman feeling -- but there's sincerity behind it. This isn't entirely coming from a place of self-justification; Akane just means what she says.

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        Akane mentions Yuta, and Lucine's expression softens, just a hair, in that split second, before she continues.

        Bright red eyes meet yellow as Akane makes mention of Lucine's priorities. It plucks at an insecurity in the back of Lucine's head, but the note goes quickly unanswered as Akane's explanation veers in another direction. ".... Then why did you care about Liam? Or about Yuta? Or Rikka?" Akane never mentioned Rikka, but she had to have a connection to her. ".... The fact that you didn't turn around and hurt him, and, yes, you're keeping him safe for now... it's the only reason I still believe what some people have told me, about you."

        Akane's not emotionally honest with herself, Kaworu had said. Or something to the same effect.

        That potential spark, that could have led to a terrible fate for Lucine (or a peaceful one, depending), is upended by a flame of a different calibur.

        "Yes. I am selfish. I never told him how I felt. And that's why I'm in the state I'm in now!!" Now Lucine is the one to take a step closer to Akane. "If he'd left because he didn't feel that way, yes, it would hurt, and I would feel terrible... but I would be a better person for going through that... these feelings are *not* an inconvience.... they're beautiful, and I'm a different person because I felt them... I'm a better person because I experienced it, even if it'd be for a short time!"

        Her words are truer than she's ever dared to be, but for Akane... how can someone feel this way? Something twisted beyond its original shape, corrupted into a feeling that is only made more disturbing by the sincerity behind it.

        "The seed of this emotion is still you... but this is..."

        Alexis's name does not summon him, no. But it's a good reminder of why she's driving into dangerous territory.

        ".... Is this what you planted all of them with?"

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

Akane finds herself with no answer to Lucine, at first. She shifts on the balls of her feet, narrowing her eyes a little bit. "What do you think?" she asks, instead of answering.

Lucine steps in, and Akane doesn't cede any ground this time. She has to look strong -- at least until she can defeat Gridman. Then everything can go back to some kind of normal. It's what she's been working for all this time -- if she lets it go, then...

"Do you even listen to yourself?" Akane asks, her tone dropping flat in an instant. "That's not how it works. You don't -- magically become a better person because you cared about someone's happiness. If anything, sometimes you kinda become worse." Staring Lucine dead in the eyes, she says, "If something can't last forever, it isn't even worth feeling. You really think getting rejected would make you better? Seems like it mostly just hollows you out, to me."

'The form matters, but you're not supposed to see what's inside. Once you get to the last one... ... it's just hollow inside.'

Juggler had challenged her on that idea, then. Now, though -- now Akane's more certain of it than ever.

'Is this what you planted all of them with?'

"I just had a nice talk. Went through a few thought experiments," Akane says, her tone starting to pick up in a way her body language -- and her heart -- can't match. "If understanding me means running away from you, that's kinda on the rest of the world for being so bad!"

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        'What do you think?'

        'Do you even listen to yourself?'

        ".... Do you?" Lucine asks back. "... I can't find what I said any worse than what you did. Things change. People grow. That's part of it. That is the meaning of a world where flowers bloom. The world can hurt, but flowers still come. They'll still bloom, whether we're there to see it or not..."
        
        She stands at a crossroads, there, the memory of meadows and dirt to still the speed of her beating heart. She could walk.

        "A talk..."

        She could still walk away.

        'Went through a few thought experiments.'

        Lucine thinks of Liam, lying asleep in his hospital bed, the young man who flew the mighty Helios, and nearly perished inside its flaming chariot of melted plastics and metals. She remembered the persistent beeping of the machines, the drip of fluid as his body was being rehydrated. Physically, he was better than he could have been, if not for everyone's quick actions. Burnt, but no infections, no injuries that would keep him in the hospital for long.

        Because if he was, Liam likely wouldn't have been able to leave.
        
        Of course he'd accept. He was at his lowest. Just, like... Akane... is....

        But it's too late. Lucine's fist is drawn back, as tears flash from her eyes. She's only trained with Zero for a few months, but a few months is enough to learn how to properly draw her fingers correctly into a tight fist, how to pull back your arm, and how to land it right where you intend to, even in a moment of anger.

        No, *especially* in a moment of anger.

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

"If you're not watching," Akane says, "the flowers're just gonna die again and again."

A metaphor that hits cleanly, for a girl whose name is as much 'madder red' as it is 'sunset-red.'

Speaking of hitting cleanly, of course, there is the elephant in the room in this equation: the punch.

Punching Akane is a strange experience. It's definitely a punch -- it definitely connects, and there's that split-second feeling of skin-to-skin contact. What's more curious, though, is that...

... well, Akane's whole body reflexively moves to accommodate it. It never quite feels like a full connection -- her neck swivels hard to one side, and the rest of her body follows with it in short order -- a singularly unnatural motion. It goes so far that she hits the ground -- and that's no less unnatural. Her body language comes off like nothing quite so much as a dropped cat's, as she -- in one rapid, smooth motion -- goes from standing, to ceding the ground so totally that she falls, to standing right back up, ending up with her back against the exterior wall of a nearby building with a dull thud.

"Wow. Way to confirm everyone's priors about people outside," is the first thing that comes out of her mouth. What she feels, however, is... a split-second stab of guilt, but then --

-- envy. Envy, off toward Liam, a bitter kind of feeling. Someone wants him -- authentically, truly. Not someone who only exists because Akane walks around in this state of perpetual, unfulfilled need. Not someone with some half-damaged 'purpose.' Not someone who needed a Vessel of Light's touch to be real and full and embodied in herself.

The weight of two worlds presses down on Akane. It's crushing.

Enough, in fact, that she doesn't think it'd be so bad to be crushed. "Want to go for a second one?" Akane asks, lip quirking up. "Not everyone gets to say they punched out a god."

Akane's native tongue is neglect, but the last two years have taught her to speak violence just fine.

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

        "... They don't need us seeing them to exist. They exist, and we exist, in the same universe."

        For all her father tried to teach Lucine how to punch, the man never cared much for teachable technique, and his young daughter even less for the concept of hurting someone.

        Akane has the dubious honor of being the first person Lucine's ever punched (outside of sparring with Zero), despite not being the terrible person Lucine secretly wished she'd be.

        So why does it feel *wrong*, even though her fist connected?

        Lucine makes a hard gasp as Akane's body 'falls' in an uncanny manner, shrinking backwards one step while cradling her hand. Did she-- no, she couldn't have actually.... hit... so hard that Akane...

        A second more and it's clear: Akane is alive. There's no mistaking the emotions spilling from her in the aftermath. Things the flavor of guilt, and.... envy? .... how? Why?

        Then, something crushing, threatening, two pits forming like black holes in one's stomach. Probably the most human emotions Lucine's felt, from Akane.
        
        Staring over at where Akane 'landed' against the wall, Lucine's stomach twists in sympathy.

        This isn't what Zero trained Lucine for. Not this.

        ".... No. You're not a god." She lets her fist drop to her side. ".... You're a prisoner trying to create a new cell. That's what he's been enabling in you, Akane." Tears rim angry, reddened eyes again, this time, for-- ".... And I doubt any of us could say we'd avoid becoming the same, in our own worlds."

<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.

Akane remains exactly where she is, staring at Lucine as she tries to figure out what it is either of them has really done, what either of them is really doing. She watches Lucine cry --

-- and finds that she can't handle that feeling anymore. A larger world is just too much. She can't show Lucine weakness -- even as she feels that weakness wind around her like a snake and begin constricting. So naturally, she takes the one path left to her.

She starts to walk away. "I don't care what you do about Liam," Akane tells her. "But don't tell me I'm a prisoner! I'm the one making the choices here. Don't think you can take that away from me."

With no other recourse left to her, she starts to stalk off, trying to salvage what's left of her day. ... then again, what's a 'day' to a god that hasn't rested in more than a year?

<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.

<poem>

       Lucine had the advantage of coming upon Akane knowing what others with more experience have told her, even *warned* her about.

       She still punched Akane, and sensed the bitter taste of Akane's emotions leaking through that mantle of godhood, leaving them at an impasse.

       In the end, it was Akane, who walked away. Whatever victory Lucine could feel instead makes her feel as hollow as Akane had mentioned, earlier, drawing in on the edges of her expression until it became a wince.

       She could grab Liam, but it won't pull him out of whatever world view Akane has infected him with. It'd be like pulling a bullet out of a wound with your own fingers.

       'Don't think you can take that away from me.'

       But isn't that what they'll do, to save the universe? To save Tsutsujidai, even? Take away her choices, even kill her?

       And Alexis would just move on, to someone else. Maybe, someone like Ruri, if she was ever at a low state.

       "...."

       The hypocrisy, and the necessity if them winning, burns her. Turning, Lucine breaks into a straight run for the Dianthus, eyes wide, and hot tears still running down her cheeks.