2025-01-26: The Paths We Must Take
- Log: 2025-01-28
- Cast: Aurora Dusk, Flay Allster
- Where: Heaven's Base
- OOC - IC Date: January 26, 0100 (2025)
- Summary: Following Gilbert Durandal's announcement, Colonel Ashcroft is all too eager to go to war, but Flay has second thoughts.
<Pose Tracker> Aurora Dusk has posed.
Heaven's Base, somewhere inbetween "Fairly Late" and "An Ungodly Hour", depending on your native timezone
Colonel Ashcroft has had a no good very bad day. It started out just fine. A rare break for her - and Aurora - in these trying times. In their line of work, days off are a fragile oasis in the desert of busywork (murder is busywork if you're in Aurora's line of work), meant to be savoured as much as possible before returning to the mines. Nights off, too, are meant to be a reprieve from... all of that nonsense. Emily is supposed to be asleep right now.
Emily is not asleep right now. Aurora is not asleep right now. The hangar bay currently being used by the Second Advanced Response Team is currently full of busy technicians and soldiers, attending to mobile weapons while officers hurry and yell at them about deadlines and urgent deployments. The Second themselves have been called to assemble urgently - some by juniors sent to drag them away from whatever they were doing at the time (whatever that happens to be), some summoned by the piercing banshee scream of the awful late night phone call ("WHO DIED?!")
When Flay arrives, the Colonel and Aurora are there, by the grace of copious amounts of caffeine, having thrown on their uniforms in the hurry only produced by having an obnoxious shouting man yelling at you to get going already. The hangar behind them is unlit, but various shapes are visible in the dark, suggestive of mobile suits.
"Lieutenant." Emily gives Flay a curt nod. "Hell of time to assemble, but... well, you saw the news, I assume."
<Pose Tracker> Aurora Dusk has posed.
"This was already going to happen, but the team is getting new machines." One of the berths behind Emily lights up, revealing... some kind of black ops looking machine. It has a visor and funnels and a vague sinister aura, despite looking like a cross between... maybe a Jesta and a GM Sniper II? Maybe a Bar-GM, if you look hard enough. Maybe not. It looks a little weird for that, though. Aurora's eyes travel up and down the length of it. "This is yours, Dusk. It's not currently FINISHED, but the brass insisted we get it here and finish work in the field, since it's basically assembled enough to transport without losing parts under the sofa. You'll probably be using this, going forwards." The machine's visor glistens as the faint light reflects off of it.
"As for me, I requisitioned... Windams. Versatile, high performance, compatible with Striker Packs. My own team should be coming around shortly, actually. They'll be in these and Jestas, mostly."
<Pose Tracker> Flay Allster has posed.
Flay already tends to have a difficult time getting to sleep in the first place. All the commotion and movement around the personal quarters area certainly isn't making it easier. Really, the last time it's been this loud around here was during the weeks after the Break the World incident.
Upon realizing that, Flay gets an uneasy feeling, and clicks on her phone, finding herself overwhelmed by the barrage of new information as it comes. Logos, behind Blue Cosmos? ZAFT making orbital drops again? It's not long after, she receives urgent orders to get dressed and meet with Colonel Ashcroft in the hangar. She doesn't have time for her usual routine, skipping any makeup or skincare - and letting her usually tied up hair hang down in a somewhat messy fashion.
She rubs her eyes, and gives the Colonel a confused look as she enters the hangar. "Colonel! What's on Earth is going on? Don't tell me... we're going to war again?" She watches all the movements of parts and machinery - rushed deployments of mobile suits, all in the dead of night. Apparently, between all this chaos, they're getting new machines.
She looks at Aurora's first, fairly unremarkable on first sight, with a few familiar design quirks. "Does that one have Psychoframe or something? It looks a little, well... strange." She guesses. "Then again, I guess you're pretty unusual yourself. Even for a Newtype." She remarks to Aurora, in what's probably not meant to be an insult, but did she figure something out?
The Windams are not the best look after the nuclear attack, but really they're just mass produced Strikes. Which makes her wonder... "Do you have a new machine for me? It's not like there's anything wrong with the Strike E..." She crosses her arms. Surely they don't plan on assigning her away from it, right? It's always been her sword to wield from the very start. "At least tell me what we're supposed to be doing with all these new units first."
<Pose Tracker> Aurora Dusk has posed.
At the moment, Ashcroft's ponytail is down, and she's wearing a dark coloured beret on her head. Not her usual choice.
The Colonel winces. "Well, I can see they dragged you up in the middle of the night too." Aurora gives Flay a sympathetic look. 'Going to war again'. 'Again'. It's a little weird to hear that when you've been doing military operations up and down for the past seven months, but perhaps from the perspective of the common soldier they haven't really been at war with anyone. Dawn of Fold is just a terrorist group, after all. The 'war' with ZAFT was unofficial until now. "Alright," Emily deadpans. "I won't tell you. You're a smart girl." She gestures to the hurried work being done. "Everyone is rushing to get ready. ZAFT is conducting drop operations - allegedly to reinforce Gibraltar, but it's in flagrant violation of the terms we had." Emily snorts. "Fat lot of good Benerit was." Not that she thought this wouldn't happen.
"Astute. Aurora's suit is a psychoframe suit, to be clear for the audience." The strange comment doesn't surprise Aurora, and she nods at Flay's observation. "I can tell you want to ask me something. Or somethings. Go ahead." She invites Flay to ask whatever she's wanted to ask since at least Ireland. Emily decides to leave that conversation to the two teenagers.
The Windams are already loaded with their striker packs. Aile, Launcher, Sword... Gunbarrel, on a few of them. "It should be fairly obvious. We're getting reinforced 'in anticipation of increased tensions'. To tell you the truth, a lot of these upgrades were already planned; Durandal just accelerated the timeframe. There are soldiers on our border and we're arming up because of it." Emily's eyes glimmer with anticipation. "Looks like we have another war on our hands. Unless somebody pulls a diplomatic miracle out of their ass." Which, her tone makes it clear she thinks would take an actual miracle. "Barring that... we're in for yet another war. Don't worry, I've been doing this shit for twenty years now. You're in good hands."
"As for your machine: well, it's not a new machine exactly." The lights in another berth switch on, revealing... the Strike E. Suspended above it... a Striker Pack. "Actaeon was producing a new striker pack in-house for the Strike E. There were... some difficulties in the process of acquiring it, but it's here now, fresh off the line. Say hello to the Noir Striker." Emily grins as the pack is slowly lowered onto the Strike E. "A close combat generalist pack combining two anti-ship swords with linear cannons and the flight capabilities of the Aile Striker. With this, the Strike E becomes a true high-performance special forces machine." The kind Emily's team would use, actually. She gives Flay a confident look. "But I think you've got what it takes." She has high hopes, here. "Kind of reminds me of my time in the Marines, actually. All the buzzing... Speaking of that, since you'll probably be needing it, I should show you some tricks. There's one I learned with C4 and tripwire... took a few zeek heads clear off back in the day with that one." She chuckles.
<Pose Tracker> Flay Allster has posed.
"Yeah... but I couldn't really sleep anyways," Flay nods to Aurora with a sigh. From the perspective of the people in it who really wanted to make a war happen, it might sound strange, but on paper, the Gaia Sabers are a peacekeeping organization. If they're going to war now, the calculus changes a lot. "Isn't it because of Logos?" Flay asks the Colonel, trying to remember all the details from Durandal's speech. "If turning them over is all it takes, why should we even get involved?" Perhaps it's just like the girl who took Lacus Clyne hostage to think of it that way. "We've already lost far too much to them."
A Psychoframe suit. And likely not one cleared with the Benerit Group, if Flay had to venture a guess. Well, it's not too unusual. She's fought alongside the Gaia Gear Alpha before. But Aurora... "You're like Lilium, aren't you? A Cyber Newtype... you both know way too much about them for that not to be the case." She looks Aurora in the eye, and then down, her tone turning flat. "It's not like I have a problem with that, but it seems like I'm always getting assigned to be around enhanced humans lately. I wonder why that might be." Well, it's one way to win the arms race when you're up against Coordinators.
"Another war..." She repeats. She's not stupid, she knew this was possible. She joined the military, to get revenge against the very people they're gearing up to fight right now. Should she be happy about that? But she thinks about Junius Seven and the nuclear assault on the PLANTs - about Nicol, and then Shinn. How much deeper can that whirlpool of hatred go? "Isn't this all happening really fast?" She tilts her head. "Just a couple weeks ago, we were all listening to some scientists preach about spreading peace through song." Not that she liked that much better.
She is curious about what her 'new machine' is supposed to be. And it's another Striker Pack. "I thought that's what the IWSP was supposed to be... but that looks even more impressive." She supposes it does make a good smokescreen for an even more advanced one being in development. The deep black Phase Shift Armour paints a deep contrast to her usual colours. "Special forces, huh? That was never really my role." She admits. "All I really amounted to was a pretty face to make the Gaia Sabers look good... but I suppose the time for that has passed." Murrue's words, that she can be an asset - or a liability, ring in her ears.
The Colonel thinks she can be an asset, but is that the role Flay really wants? As she reminisces of.. 'better' days in the Marines, Flay shoots her a mildly horrified look. "Excuse me?" It turns out she isn't used to casually joking around about blowing people's heads up just yet.
<Pose Tracker> Aurora Dusk has posed.
Aurora nods back at Flay. The Gaia Sabers are a peacekeeping force, to her and the Colonel. It's just that peacekeeping either requires a lot of murder or is a euphemism for it. If you want peace, you must prepare for war.
It's a happy accident that if you want war you have to prepare for war too.
"Believe me, Lord Djibril can go fuck himself", the Colonel says, quietly enough that the only ears that hear belong to people who she trusts to agree. "You know that's his actual name? Lord. Arrogant bastard." She shakes her head. "But. Personally, I'm not keen on giving Durandal what he wants at effectively gunpoint. We had a deal with Benerit, and he's breaking it after dropping an announcement on us in the middle of the night. That's not what you do when you want a peaceful resolution to anything." Emily makes a Face that indicates her distaste for 'whatever the zeek bastard is up to'. Her tone is a little more casual than it's usually been when she talks business. Fuck this and damn that. It's definitely the mouth of an ECOAS trooper... "You give an inch, and some people will take a mile and then demand more, waving the same gun they were threatening you with before. Way I see it, he's planning on selling the fight and we're buying." Emily's heart is set on this fight, and her mind is set in its ways. This is just another repeat of the same stage show she's ran what, like five times now? They'll fight the Zeon menace again and drive them off again and hopefully this time crush them hard enough it sticks.
Oh, the prototype in the hangar is DEFINITELY not cleared with Benerit. Not for what it is, not for what they plan on adding. "That's right. I'm a Cyber-Newtype. And I have to know a lot about what I am." Aurora confirms what she is out loud, finally. She meets Flay's gaze and holds it. "We're around. I think it was a coincidence Lilium got picked for what she did, though." Aurora looks at Emily, this time, as if asking if she should tell Flay about Emi's other specialty. "Maybe we'll get more in our squad... Any other questions?"
"Yeah, we WERE working on the songstress thing. But that's a pipe dream right now, and needs must as the devil drives. We do what it takes to survive, and sometimes that means you have to scratch and claw and bite the old fashioned way." Emi is definitely familiar with that kind of fighting. "And that's right, this IS moving fast. But the gears were already in motion. They've been moving since before Rindt decided to try human wave tactics with nuclear weapons. Speaking of. You remember I told you to keep an eye out back then? Still applies here. There's a lot you can learrn."
Emily continues her explanation of the Strike Noir. "The IWSP is one thing. This is another. When the Strike is equipped with it, it becomes the Strike Noir. After the distinctive colour they pre-programmed... by the way, if you want to put any flourishes on it, go ahead. I won't write you up for it." Emily smiles. "Pretty face for the Sabers, huh... Don't sell yourself short. The brass don't always see it how it is. Maybe the time's come for a new role... also, yeah. I never brought it up, but 'special forces' is my hat." She points at the beret on her head. "The Ninth - the Werewolves are coming here. I'll introduce you, if you like. Reliable."
"Yeah," the Colonel says, casually. "We had to improvise a lot back in 79. I got transferred back and forth. Air force in a VF, mobile suits for the marines... we saw on-foot combat, too. Eh." She shrugs. "Maybe you don't have experience with it, but... You do what it takes to survive, when the time comes. A lot of pilots these days can't handle it. Remind me to give everyone a crash course if we have the time."
She pulls out a lighter, and a cigarette, looking around for people who would whine about it. "Speaking of the past... I've been doing some thinking. Past battles. Past mistakes, too." Flip. Click. Smoke. "...was talking to Valerie about it before she got reassigned. Had a conversation that... helped elucidate some things, that I've been thinking about, especially now we're on the brink of doing this again." The mistakes of the past - the mistakes Emi was party to. Can she really say the Titans did the right thing? Practically, of course. Morally, there's no question in her mind she made the right choice. "Lilium is a smart kid too. Good head on her shoulders... I wish we'd gotten to keep her, actually." Fond tone here. "Well, we'll still work with her, but I was starting to see her as a student, kind of... I've mentored soldiers before, and I used to be a teacher. Or at least I was studying to be one. War kind of derailed it," she says, gesturing with her cigarette. "I've seen some shit, Flay," the Colonel says
with weary eyes. "Done some shit, too. I talk about the early days a lot because they left an impression on me, I guess.
But like I keep saying, it took certain things to survive, and I did them. Regrets would be useless. I wanted to defend
my home, and then I believed in the ideal of the Federation, and I fought to defend it. I won't stop until it's over.""
<Pose Tracker> Flay Allster has posed.
"Believe me, I want answers on Logos too," Flay nods, and can't really muster a laugh at the Colonel's comments on Djibril. "My father was Blue Cosmos. It's not out of the realm of possibility he was involved in this. I might never know... but honestly, part of me doesn't really want to." She thought the world of her father, despite his hatred, and that hatred became part of her, too. It hurts so much to let go, but if she doesn't...
"And I can't say I trust Durandal. But isn't this just playing directly into his hands? If we let this escalate..." This time, she thinks of the destruction of Heliopolis in her broken lifepod, of watching her father's ship explode before her eyes. The cold hatred in her eyes as she sent Kira off into battle. "So many people will die." She's not just talking about enemy casualties. The only reason she's here at all is because she had her life uprooted by a war she had no control over.
"I could tell you've been fighting for way longer than I have." Flay nods, when Aurora confirms what she really is. "I guess it's all you've ever really had. I think that's a shame." She frowns. Maybe it was a coincidence - but that doesn't really make it a pleasant one. It just means it's a common enough occurance. "No, not really." She concludes, about questions.
"'The war never really ended, it was just put on pause', is that it?" She asks, of the gears turning. "Even though humanity was nearly wiped out by the last one twice over." And not just the last one. Nearly every human conflict in the last hundred years was devastating for the human population. "I heard the Federation sacrificed their entire base just to win a battle. The only reason I'm still here is because high command thought my life was worthy of being saved, so I was transferred away." She looks at the Colonel. "Do you think they have a weapon like that underneath Heaven's Base?" She asks, hushed.
Something about the Strike Noir unsettles Flay, even though it's the same machine she's been piloting this whole time. It's as if the darkness in her heart is being reflected back at her. "Maybe, but... it's not like I have any particularly special talents," She says, though it's partially a lie of omission. She doesn't understand that 'seed' in her heart, and she's not certain she wants the Colonel to, either. "I'm a totally average pilot... but the Strike is a symbol." Perhaps the Strike Noir is one, too. She just nods silently, about the Werewolves.
"I've handled a gun before, and I've even pulled the trigger before." That doesn't mean she actually landed a shot with it, but all the same, she can't really say she's proud of it. "I just don't think it's something to brag about." Maybe it really does mean she isn't much of a soldier, like that Marian woman told her some time ago.
Flay listens quietly as the Colonel recounts her own mistakes. There's the slightest twitch in her eyebrows, at the way she talks about Lilium. "You wish you got to 'keep' her? Is that what you're going to say if something terrible happens to me? How long are we going to keep pretending this is normal?" Her eyes narrow. It's as if she's talking about a student who just got transferred into a different class, maybe she really would be better as a teacher.
"Still... I understand. I did things I wasn't proud of to survive, too. Before I could fight, I used the only thing I knew how, my body." The way she talks makes it sound like she's describing sex work, but it might seem unlikely for a rich heiress to take on that line of work. This isn't the kind of thing she just tells anyone. "And I manipulated others to get what I wanted. But I also understand that just because I was trying to survive, doesn't make what I did okay." She sighs. "It doesn't make me better than you, either. But I never want to become someone who can pretend nothing is wrong with this."
<Pose Tracker> Aurora Dusk has posed.
"I never met your father, but he was pretty well known to the senior officers. Public figure and all that." Emily pauses. "He did good work... is what I would like to tell his daughter, but I'll take the shame of speaking ill of the dead over the shame of lying to you. ...I think you're better than he was." She doesn't mean to imply anything about Flay being better than her hatred, better than the cycle, but it's not particularly up to her how Flay takes it.
"Maybe he's got us where he wants us, but I don't see any way out other than through." She never has, on the ideological level. Lateral thinking is mainly for achieving your goals, not wondering if your first principles are sound. "And yes, people will die. I'm aware of the background the Archangel crew all shared..." Emily thinks of her own past tragedies. Aurora's, too. Maybe it's better to have loved and lost than never loved at all, but the pain of separation makes a compelling argument. "That's... that's the life we lead, I suppose. Even though every war burns down the survivors more and more, with no end in sight." Her voice hardens. "That's why it's so important to finally end," she clenches her fist as if crushing an insect, "this destructive cycle of war, and separatism, and terror, and the brief half-times inbetween the formal wars. No more conflict, no more... superweapons pointed at our home, no more Earth Drop Operations, no more colony drops." She finishes her diatribe sounding a little stronger than she'd intended, but it's a sore topic for her. Damn Gato. If not for him... "The Universal Century is the century of warfare... and heartbreak, I suppose." The extremely brief flash of vulnerability passes as soon as Emily realises what she's doing and composes herself. Can't show weakness, not before allies, not before enemies. A pack of wolves, all of them. The only way to survive is to be the most vicious.
Fighting for way longer than Flay has. It's all she's ever known. Flay has her pegged. Aurora nods. "That's right. I've been fighting for most of my life... and I like to think I'm good at it," she adds. She's as good as the Colonel beat into her. Aurora Dusk successfully became what she needed to be, to survive... the training, the combat, the labs... She became what they needed her to be and that's what she is. One of Crucible's successes, something whispers in her ear. She blinks. That was a thought, not a whisper, right?
Flay brings up the destruction of a Federation base. "Been there," Emily says, before Flay goes on to talk about her own experience. "Well, I meant an earlier time. They tried to blow me up too. Not personally, but. Jaburo. I curse the incompetent who decided to blow up one of our most fortified bases." She gives Flay a subtly sympathetic look. "It sure was a crush trying to get away... airships were loaded. I was so mad when they repeated that stunt. All the expenses of the G-Project, and the crew that was actually experienced with using them... and they decide it's too tainted by that Kira boy's grubby Coordinator paws, I suppose." She rolls her eyes. "He had potential. Skilled pilot. Chose to fight for us. And they pissed it away over his genetic status. That's nothing. We didn't have the luxury of whinging and throwing tantrums like Azrael's gang always does back when-. If it was up to me, maybe we WOULD be handing over a bunch of LOGOS's dipshits." She shakes her head. "Forgive an old woman her rambling."
"Every pilot starts out that way at first. Maybe you're not a Kira or an Amuro, but don't sell yourself short. Besides, I think I remember you mentioning some kind of... Newtype like phenomena, right? I kept a note of it." She lowers her voice back down, conspiratorially. "...no shade to Lilium, but... I don't think I need to worry about you accepting offers concerning experimental procedures." She looks slightly sad, again. Ah, poor Lilium. She doesn't even know they castrated her yet. Did they even tell her what they were going to do?
"Handling a gun and knowing how to fight are separate things. And you don't have to be proud of it, you just have to know how to do it."
"...Soldiers transfer back and forth, I suppose." It's definitely not normal. Most soldiers who get enhanced don't get fucked up so drastically. You get spec ops guys who volunteer for an extra set of lungs, sometimes. "...I told you I've seen a lot of fighting in my time. Not everyone lives." It doesn't escape her that 'something terrible' alludes to experiments, not death.
Emily raises an eyebrow, but doesn't say much on the topic of what Flay did. It's normal in upper class society, probably. "I see. Maybe it's wrong or maybe it isn't, but those were the circumstances of our lives. Not the same way it was for you, but I've done things that people have cursed me for." She looks upwards, praying to nonexistent heavens. "...Every form of life on this planet wants to continue living. We both did what we thought would let us live through our experiences. If there was ever a chance for me," her tone gets a little wistful, " to wash these bloodstains from my hands..." She looks back downwards, to the realm of the living, the realm she clung to with all her might. "...it has passed and been forgotten. These are the paths that we must take, now."
<Pose Tracker> Flay Allster has posed.
"No, you don't need to lie to me." Flay agrees, though with some bitterness in her voice. "I still wish he was alive, even now." It's something she's never been able to get over, and it's difficult to separate her father, who dotes on her in private, from the public figure he was. "But I don't want Logos to use me as some... prop, because of him, either." She sighs. If she stays here, she can't see it turning out any differently.
"Will it end after this, do you think?" Flay wonders. That's what Rau le Creuset said he was going to do, and it was clear he meant the only way to end the cycle of war was to wipe out humanity in its whole. And then Nicol and the other Zala supporter remnants showed up to prove his point. "I guess it's just easy to feel powerless in the wake of it all. As if being able to fight it won't even change anything." She stares off at the Strike Noir. Her mobile suit. "But if you do have that kind of power..."
"I've seen you in action. You are." Flay says, to Aurora about her combat skills. She'll probably never know anything else, because this is the life she has to live, until one day, she dies. That's the life of a Cyber Newtype, and nothing Flay's experiences really lines up with it. "There's no way it doesn't bother you a little, right? That this is what it took to survive?"
The Colonel relates the destruction of JOSH-A to another, similar incident - the nuclear detonation of Jaburo. She thinks she remembers that one from the textbooks. That was when the Titans were in control of it, wasn't it? "I'm sure it's nothing they didn't think they could replace... even the lives it took." She frowns, and then looks temporarily stunned as she brings up Kira Yamato. "You're wrong about one thing." Flay looks the Colonel in the eye. "He didn't fight for you. He fought for me." It's an important distinction in her eyes. "But now, he's finally free from such things." She understands the point the Colonel's really trying to make... but in the end she knows neither of them will be making that decision.
"Eh? Newtype? I'm not rated for funnels or anything like that," She tries to play dumb about it, but of course she'd remember that. "...I don't fully understand it myself, but it's protected me up to this point." Well, at least Colonel Ashcroft doesn't seem enthusiastic about the idea of her being sent off to some lab in who knows where. At least that's reassuring, among all the things that aren't reassuring. "...You'd have to be pretty desperate to consent to something like that. Maybe I would have if it was three years ago." Then again, it probably isn't even informed consent.
Self-defense is indeed important, Flay can accept that much. She would never shoot an unarmed, injured prisoner of war, why would you say that about her? "Right. I know what I signed up for," And dying is indeed a possibility. "But I also know what I didn't sign up for."
This time, having told Emily her story, Flay makes more of an effort to understand hers. She can't imagine how many people this woman must have killed. "You haven't forgiven yourself either," Flay points out. And from there, it's all to easy to believe that there's no way forward except down. That you can take comfort in knowing at least you took others down with you. "But still... I should thank you, Colonel. I think... I know what I must do now." Murrue told her she knows she could make good decisions. She never told her what that decision must be. Her eyes remain fixed on the Strike Noir - no, her Strike E.