2024-06-25: Adjustment Period
- Log: 2024-06-25 Adjustment Period
- Cast: Suletta Mercury, Elan Ceres
- Where: Asticassia School of Technology
- OOC - IC Date: June 25, UC 0099 (2024)
- Summary: Suletta and Elan have a conversation about her being the Holder and him having hurt someone's feelings.
<Pose Tracker> Suletta Mercury has posed.
Ever since Miorine told Suletta that her uniform was wrong -- and CHANGED IT! -- everyone has been staring at her.
People were staring at Suletta, let's be fair, even before she wore the white Holder's uniform. She's the Witch from Mercury, so they say, with a Gundam made from forbidden technology.
("What, like psychoframe?" "No, they would have already taken it if it was psychoframe..." "Maybe it's a new, worse kind of psychoframe! Like -- like murderframe!" "Stupid, you can't just say anything-frame. Psychoframe is a specific thing." "But my mom told me there's voidframe out there, too..." "Your company is 57th in ranking, what would your mother know?" "WHAT ARE YOU SAYING ABOUT MY MOM?!")
... it's all really awkward to pretend not to be able to hear. Mom says that Suletta should let them talk, because she's going to show them they're wrong, but sometimes she really wants to interrupt, if only to ask.
Suletta sneaks through the hall, between classes, trying her very level best not to be stared at. Unfortunately --
"Sneak, sneak, sneak..."
-- Suletta is very obviously sneaking through the hall. She's even providing her own sound effects.
Everyone is still staring and whispering.
<Pose Tracker> Elan Ceres has posed.
There have been quite a few new duels since Suletta became the new Holder. It is almost certain that, for example, those two arguing about murderframes are going to end up dueling, most likely to make the one apologize for kind of-sort of badmouthing the other's mom. Elan has accordingly been busy.
But he still attends classes, as do they all, and he and Suletta are in the same program, even if they're in different years. So it so happens that as Suletta is attempting--very badly--to sneak through the hall in between classes, Elan is approaching from the other direction. His pretty face is set with its usual indifference, but when he spots her, it shifts, just a touch. He doesn't smile, but his yellow-green eyes focus on her as his pace slows and he stops to watch her. Certainly there's something here to interest him.
"Suletta Mercury. What are you doing?" he wonders after a moment.
<Pose Tracker> Suletta Mercury has posed.
Really, it's a wonder more people don't wear gloves around here with everyone demanding satisfaction. That's how it always was in the anime about that era. The characters would slap each other with gloves and yell 'I DEMAND SATISFACTION!' and mom always said it was a reference but Suletta and Aerial never did figure out exactly what it was a reference to.
Suletta always thought it was very rude to do that, though, so maybe it's good that people don't start their duels like that.
"Sneak, sneak, snNAAUGH?!"
That's the sound of Suletta watching those students as she sneaks, only for her head to WHIP around at the sound of her name, arms still up, one leg still bent high above the ground in an exaggerated sneaking pose. "M-M-M-M-M-M-Mr. E-E-Elan!!!" Her arms wave in front of her, and then windmill out to either side of her as she threatens to lose her balance. "Nyeep!!"
Hopping back a step, and then another, she finally gets her footing, hands planted on her knees as she sags forward.
"Everyone's staring at me," she sighs, "so I'm just trying to sneak past unnoticed..."
"We noticed," a snide girl from the Management Program says, as she keeps walking past, nose firmly in the air. (And as she walks off, she asides, to her friend: "Really, Master Guel dodged a bullet.")
Suletta's teeth clench, as she makes a terrible broken sound which sounds a lot like, "Eeeeee..."
<Pose Tracker> Elan Ceres has posed.
Perhaps that's why Elan wears gloves...
(No, it's completely unrelated.)
Elan watches in real time as Suletta whips around, all but spasming in shock of being caught. When she tilts dangerously over, one of his hands twitches--but she staggers back a step or two and leans forward onto her knees. His hand stills. No one, including Elan, will know if he would have caught her if she hadn't caught herself.
He looks to one side at the snide girl and her friend passing by. A couple of Guel's fans, he recalls. (He does not recall their names.) He looks back at Suletta, now keening softly.
"She's right. It isn't possible for you to evade notice," he says softly. Her uniform alone will draw people's eyes--even if that's not the only reason people are staring. "If it bothers you, would you like me to walk you the rest of the way to class? You'll still be stared at, but you won't be alone."
<Pose Tracker> Suletta Mercury has posed.
Guel has a lot of fans, and none of them can understand why Suletta would pass up his hand in marriage. Surely she doesn't really intend to marry Miorine?!
And surely, Elan wouldn't have caught Suletta.
"I-I-I d-don't want to b-b-b-b-b-b-bother --" anyone? Elan? Wait, hang on, Elan -- "w-would it be okay?" Suletta asks, looking up to him, her big, BIG blue eyes wide. "I-if you're w-walking to class a-anyway..."
She presses her fingertips together, as she admits: "... I, I wanted to walk to class with a friend. It's on my List." And surely Elan is her friend. Even though -- "M-Miss Miorine says we shouldn't trust you, b-but... I just don't think you're a bad person, Mr. Elan. S-so, maybe--?"
Is it okay for them to be friends?!
<Pose Tracker> Elan Ceres has posed.
Suletta starts to refuse--but then she seems to catch herself, and asks instead if it's okay. "Yes," Elan tells her. Suletta doesn't know him well enough that he wouldn't have made the offer if he didn't want to do it, but that's all right.
His deadpan turns a touch pensive when she mentions that walking to class with a friend is on her list. "Is that so?"
She's ticked off a few entries on her lis with him now. This hadn't been his intent, unlike last time, but--it doesn't displease him to think of helping her tick off a few more.
She goes on. It takes a second for it to click to him what Suletta is trying to imply. A faint lightness rises in his chest. He doesn't know what it is or how better to describe it. But it isn't unpleasant, either.
"I'd like to be your friend, Suletta Mercury," he replies. "Are you all right being friends with me, too?"
Even if Miorine doesn't like or trust him?
<Pose Tracker> Suletta Mercury has posed.
"I... I'd like to," Suletta confesses, her fingers lacing between each other as she fiddles with her hands, looking at them instead of at him. (This hides the light dusting of pink on her cheeks exactly not at all. Flawless sneaking.) "I'm just worried... that Miss Miorine needs me to stay away."
What she wants, versus what someone else needs...
Maybe it sounds familiar. Maybe Suletta should find it familiar.
"But-- but if it's just walking t-to class, I'm not doing anything wrong, right?" She justifies it to herself, with a big, too-sunny smile. "Yeah! There's nothing wrong with that!"
<Pose Tracker> Elan Ceres has posed.
This complete incapacity for sneaking is fine. Maybe another person would call it charming. Elan would merely say it's... relaxing. Whether Suletta knows the truth about herself or not, her sincerity is a breath of fresh air for him in a lot of ways.
"I don't mind," Elan says, though of course the important thing here is not what he does or doesn't mind. Either way, he half-turns. "Shall we go?"
Once they're on their way--Elan will let Suletta lead the way, as she's the one who knows where her classroom is--he wonders, "Are you having trouble with getting used to being the Holder?"
After all, she was trying to sneak to class because people were staring at her, and again, even if people would be staring anyway, being the Holder would only give them more cause to stare.
Of course, the students of Asticassia are just like that. They love to gossip. They'll no doubt be gossiping about Elan and Suletta walking to class (or a class, anyway) together, just as they gossiped about Elan and Miorine having an argument in class some weeks back.
That's something Elan's already forgotten about, though.
<Pose Tracker> Suletta Mercury has posed.
"Oh! Yes!" Suletta says, as she pauses, as if waiting for Elan to start walking, only to realise one agonisingly awkward moment later: "--o-oh! This way!"
She really expected to just follow him around, huh.
Luckily, once she gets it, Suletta starts leading the way to Fundamentals of Mobile Suit Resource Management, the most agonising class on the planet, all about teaching rich kids that you only have so much battery power before your beam weapons have no juice left. (They also touch on the fact that missiles cost money and no one can mount infinite missiles onto a mech, but of course they don't focus on it, because Asticassia believes in not polluting space.) Suletta ought to be good at it -- she knows all about making Aerial's runtime work for her -- except that they expect her to cite her sources and apparently she's not allowed to just use websites she searches up even though she knows it's true...
Anyway, enough about Suletta's terrible grades, Elan is asking a question. "Y--yeah," Suletta nods, her hands still clasped in front of her as she walks. "Miss Miorine said I had a special uniform now, b-but now everyone knows who I am... I'm worried they'll want to fight me just because of that."
The real miracle is that no one has issued her a challenge yet.
"Everyone recognises me now," she says. "And -- and they all say -- it was bad I ran away from Mr. Guel. I-I was just really surprised... I thought that's how it was supposed to go. In the movies, everyone shakes hands at the end when they realise they should have respected each other more... b-but I guess he thought..." Her hands curl over each other, nervously. "H-he's... kind of frightening," she admits. "I don't... know what to do when someone is like that... it's overwhelming. But, I don't think he was trying to scare me... it's stuck in my head a lot."
<Pose Tracker> Elan Ceres has posed.
Elan is at least patient. He has his own class to get to, but he frankly doesn't care if he's late or not, or if he shows up for it at all. Walking with Suletta to her class is more important to him (is important to him at all).
"That will probably happen," Elan remarks, which no doubt does nothing for Suletta's anxiety. "Guel Jeturk had many challengers while he was still the Holder. You probably haven't had any challengers yet because of how strong you and Aerial are. Those who would challenge you need to work up the nerve first."
He oversees quite a few duels, so he would know. But it seems as though, even after beating Guel twice, Suletta still finds him scary. Overbearing, even overwhelming. Elan quite agrees, even if his way of dealing with it is different.
"I was surprised too," he says. "By his proposal, I mean. That doesn't usually happen." He reflects on this statement for a second or two, gaze going down as they walk. "I think."
He looks back at her. He doesn't know how to express how it was a relief that she ran away from Guel's proposal, but she does seem agitated about it. "You seem to scare easily. Even so, you choose to fight--not even for yourself, but for someone else. Miorine Rembran is fortunate to have a friend as stalwart as you."
<Pose Tracker> Suletta Mercury has posed.
Isn't it nice to be important?
"I-I didn't think me and Aerial were that intimidating..." Suletta says, with a sense of wonder about it all. "I thought I was the one who was nervous!" Are people -- nervous about her?! That's terrible! How could she do that to them --
She heaves a great sigh, listening to Elan's reassurance about duels, and says: "That's a relief..." Is Suletta, perhaps, not looking for a hand in marriage? It's kind of strange, given how she's the Holder, but she's a strange girl. "I don't know what I'd do if everyone proposed to me after a duel."
Well, no, she knows exactly what she'd do, run away screaming at full volume every time. But what she means is that she doesn't know what she'd do about it. Post up a message on the school VERTEX going 'I Am Not Looking For Suitors, Thank You'? Wear a sign around her neck? She can't spray-paint it on Aerial; Aerial is proud of the way she looks.
She smiles, though, when Elan calls her stalwart. "Miss Miorine needs someone to fight for her," she says, "so of course I'll fight. If someone's in trouble, you should help them, right?" And of course it's Miorine who is in trouble, not...
<Pose Tracker> Elan Ceres has posed.
She is a strange girl. But it makes sense to Elan. Suletta only got caught up in the duels because she saw how Guel was treating Miorine and couldn't stand by and let it happen. Her goal has never been to "win" Miorine. Miorine may have called her sex-crazed, and going on dates may be one of the things on Suletta's list, but it seems as though she's not that indiscriminate about it.
(No, she has a type, doesn't she? Pale skin and pale hair. Elan remembers Leina telling him about that, and a shadow passes briefly over his lack of expression.)
"I don't think you are," he says aloud of her and Aerial. (Elan is already used to the idea of a Gundam that eats your life.) "But many students here are easily threatened. It's why there's so many duels."
(And so Elan rids himself of that shadow by casting shade--)
Oh, never mind. It remains after all when Suletta talks about helping those in trouble. Elan's gaze goes briefly distant. "Not everyone thinks that way. I know very few people who do," he says softly. A pause. He looks back at Suletta. "...But it's good that you do."
Even if he imagines Miorine is only using Suletta. But that isn't really his business. If Suletta is choosing to fight for her, then they both benefit, probably. It's called a symbiotic relationship. Nonetheless, that makes him wonder, "Have you completed many of the things on your list with her?"
An unspoken assumption there in that many.
<Pose Tracker> Suletta Mercury has posed.
Isn't it a normal thing for teenage girls to want to go on a date..? ... though, Miorine doesn't seem to think so. So maybe not...
"We're not trying to be threatening," Suletta says, quite concerned. "Maybe there's something we can do to be friendlier..." How do you make Aerial look friendly to the world, though?
Suletta will think about it.
She tilts her head, when Elan says most people don't think that way -- but she smiles, when he affirms it's good she does. "I just think it's good," she says... and it probably is as simple as that.
"I--I tried to give Miss Miorine a, a nickname," Suletta grows nervous, again, her hands weaving together. "But she -- she thought it was dumb, so... but she did skip class with me one time!" She brightens, only to clap her hands over her mouth. "Oh, I shouldn't admit that..."
The school cops will be by shortly to take her away to school jail.
Suletta looks back and forth, though, and she can't see the school cops coming for her yet. (They'd be riding Haro Scooters with flashing lights atop their heads, presumably.) "But... Mr. Elan, were you... really just treating people like subordinates to delegate things to in group projects?" She asks, reminded of Miorine's suffering, and notably without implicating her in the question. "I-- I think... I think maybe... that can make people feel bad. N-not that I'm saying anyone in particular -- I mean -- um--!" She really thinks she's not implicating Miorine, here. "I just thought... if it was a misunderstanding... maybe I should just tell you. I thought... maybe you just didn't know that's how it felt to other people, since... since, I don't know how I make other people feel a lot, too. It's hard to read them sometimes... um... but maybe I shouldn't say anything..."
<Pose Tracker> Elan Ceres has posed.
"You worry a lot about what others think of you, Suletta Mercury," Elan observes. "You don't need to. How others see you is only their own subjective viewpoint; it's not who you really are." It's not a direct quote, but still a one-sentence summary of the philosophy in The World as Will and Idea. That book has helped him with a lot of things.
Suletta has her own variation on that herself. Even when she's so wrapped up in what others want and trying to make others happy, she still has her own coda that she stands by. She's not such a mutable person that she doesn't have a core self. Elan knows it's easier in a lot of ways to not care, but the fact that she does--that she insists on it as 'good'--is so...
...
In any case, he reassures her, "It's okay. I won't tell." No school cops for Suletta today. His mien turns somewhat nonplussed when she brings up him treating people like subordinates. It's about when she insists it's totally not about anyone in particular that his gaze rises towards the ceiling. "...Oh, yes. That did happen."
He looks back at her as she goes on, listening to what she has to say. At the end, he gazes off into the distance. "...You're right. I wasn't thinking of how it would make her feel." Granted, he doesn't care about how Miorine feels, but he understands that's not Suletta's point, and anyway, he understands that Suletta wants to protect Miorine, and he does care about how Suletta feels.
"It wasn't really a misunderstanding," he adds. He knew what he was doing when he said it, even if it was something he thought a Peil CEO would say. For the same reason, he continues, "But it's true that it was callous of me." He knows that because it's something a Peil CEO would say.
None of that still makes him care about what Miorine thinks or feels, any more than he would expect her to care about what he thinks or feels. But he does remember well what Suletta wagered on her second duel with Guel, and so he focuses in on her with those soft eyes. "...Does that upset you?"
Enough to challenge him to a duel?
<Pose Tracker> Suletta Mercury has posed.
"B-but... but it matters, doesn't it? If people don't like you, you don't fit in... then you might have to leave! A-and I can't go, I promised I'd help Miss Miorine!!" It's the sort of anxiety which makes sense, coming from a small community like Mercury, but...
Maybe Suletta should watch a little less anime and read a few more books.
Elan won't tell the cops, though, which is a relief. (Wait, is he the cops?! AAAAAAAAAAAAAA--) He goes on to explain, and...
"H--huh?" Suletta is honestly surprised to hear Elan say it was callous, but it wasn't a misunderstanding, either. Elan asks if it upsets her, and she waves her hands in front of her, suddenly deeply nervous. "I-- I--!"
WHAT DOES SHE DO OH GOD HE DID A BAD THING
"I-I-I-I think you shouldn't do callous things, Mr. Elan!" Suletta squeaks out, eventually, clapping her hands in front of her and lowering her head. "I'm s-sorry, but, but please consider other people's feelings a little more! Mis-- mm, umm -- it makes people feel bad! And -- and I don't think you want to make people feel bad, Mr. Elan!" She opens up one eye a crack, looking up at him entirely too earnestly. "You don't want that... right...?"
She really wants to believe in him.
<Pose Tracker> Elan Ceres has posed.
It matters, Suletta insists. And she provides a perspective different from Elan's own: if you aren't liked and you don't fit in, you'll be rejected and you might have to leave. It's not just paranoia; that was a real threat that loomed over her until she gained legitimacy as the Holder. Even now, she isn't truly accepted. That's a position she's in that he isn't, due to his face and his clout. She can't simply get away with ignoring people like he can. He stops in his tracks and takes a moment to consider that.
Of course, this is also when the conversation moves on to Miori--other people and how his general indifference might hurt their feelings. "..."
Does he want to make people feel bad?
"No," he says.
But it isn't out of kindness. It's because he doesn't care. In the same way, he doesn't want to make others feel good, either. He ultimately capitulated to cooperating and doing his fair share of that group assignment, but only because it was rapidly turning out that "delegating" was more trouble than it was worth.
He wonders if he should explain this to her.
He decides that it's more trouble than it's worth.
Yet at the same time--
"...if I were to say otherwise, would you challenge me to a duel, too?" he wonders.
<Pose Tracker> Suletta Mercury has posed.
"Oh," Suletta sighs, sagging down, hands to her knees again, "thank goodness!" She sees the best in his 'no'; if he doesn't want to make people feel bad, surely it's because he wants to be a good person.
She has a few seconds to be relieved before she springs right back up with a new batch of alarm, freshly-baked. "W-w-w-what?!" She yelps, throwing her hands up in front of her. "I-i-if you -- but you didn't say that!"
It's called a theoretical situation, Suletta.
Suletta grasps her hands in front of her, as she frowns. "Um... but if you did say you wanted to m-make people feel bad, then... then I would," she admits, eventually. "S--since that's not the right thing... to do. People shouldn't hurt other people... that's what I think."
She glances aside, nervously.
And then she stops, and her eyes widen. "EEeeeehhh?!" She yelps, as she points at the room number. "T-t-t-t-two six four-- m-my room is t-two four EIGHT! Mr. Elan, w-we went right past it--!! Oh, I'm gonna be late--!!"
She turns around, and starts hurrying the other way, cursing herself for getting distracted from such a simple thing.
<Pose Tracker> Elan Ceres has posed.
What is a good person, really?
Elan doesn't know. The closest he can see around him is Suletta herself.
So while he did ask to be certain, it's no surprise to him that she confirms she would. This is her form of 'right' and 'wrong'--one that she adheres to, instead of doing something she has mixed feelings on and weakly objecting to it but never following through.
People shouldn't hurt each other. That's what she thinks, and so that's how she behaves. Elan watches her in silence for a moment as she averts her eyes.
But then she points at the nearby room number in alarm. He follows her gaze, then looks at her as she turns to run back. He doesn't tend to hurry anywhere; certainly he won't hurry to his own class once he's seen her off. But without quite thinking about it, his feet lift, and he leans forward, and he hurries after her.
They hurry all the way to two four eight. Elan will stop there as Suletta heads in--but before she can shut the door behind her, he'll call softly, "Suletta Mercury." When she looks back--when their eyes meet--he continues, "You won't need to challenge me to a duel for that. I'll apologize to her."
That's apparently also his form of good-bye, because he'll leave her to her class to walk off at a sedate pace.
<Pose Tracker> Suletta Mercury has posed.
Suletta doesn't think of herself as an especially good person, but maybe that's part of why she can come off that way.
The only problem Suletta has with this, notably... is the idea that Elan might do something wrong. She's already decided he's nice; she struggles with the idea that he might do something bad. But if that's a crime, isn't the crime believing in people too much...?
(Does she even know who she believes in?)
"T-thank you very much!" She huffs, to Elan, when she reaches the door. "I-- I'll be okay now!" And she opens the door, and she's about to head in -- the stare of her lecturer cut short by her noticing Elan, in the doorway -- when she hears her name, again.
And, again, she turns. Less whiplash, this time, but still attentive.
"Thank you," she says, again, with a different shade of relief and a sunny, sunny smile. "I knew you were a nice person, Mr. Elan!" But she can feel the gaze of the lecturer at the back of her head -- so shortly thereafter, she hurries inside.
She doesn't even realise that Miorine might be mad she brought this up.