2022-02-19: The 'Process' Of Understanding
- Log: The 'Process' Of Understanding
- Cast: Ruri Hoshino, Kay
- Where: Perth, Australia
- Date: 2022-02-19
- Summary: Two youngsters get lost in a shipping port, and each find a new friend in the other.
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
When they were in the Orb Union, the Nadesico visited the Dreisstrager, briefly, for a data transfer.
Briefly.
Anyway, now the ship is off doing Nadesico things, which involves a stop at a port in Perth, on the other side of the country to that crater which used to be Sydney. An awful lot of people live around here, which makes it a busy harbour, even if one happens to be a massive battleship.
The Nadesico has opened up its cargo bay to receive something or another, which means that the ship is currently not going anywhere fast. This means that the Nadesico's Systems Operator has wandered down to watch things get loaded up, because nothing bad happened the last time Ruri wandered down to port, so clearly it's fine.
It is an awfully busy port, though. Even with people from the Nadesico trying to keep an eye on her -- which, obviously, pretty much all the adults of the Nadesico are on-board for, because they care about their littlest crewmember -- it doesn't take terribly long for Ruri to be lost in the hustle and bustle.
She doesn't actually notice, though. She finds a box to sit on, legs kicking to and fro, and watches the ~magic of shipping~.
<Pose Tracker> Kay has posed.
Ruri isn't the only person here.
Well, that's a given. Ports are busy. But she's not the only crewmember who is feeling a little out of place... even if the other one is from a very different ship.
Kay has never been to a port like this before, at least not while conscious. She's been shipped through ports like this, but that's not the same at all. She wasn't awake for it, though in different ways the last two times she transferred through.
So she wanted to see it the next time she had the opportunity, but mostly she's being an obstacle. Not intentionally, of course. She's just large - about the size of a macronized Zentredi - and more closely resembles an ambulatory mobile suit than anything more human-like in frame. Bipedal, with that kind of flared armour, though she's left all her weapons and sharp edges at home.
She doesn't really have a face - just a faintly green-glowing visor with long rabbit-ear antenna that might be mistaken for a Gundam V-fan at a distance - but she gives the impression of curiosity anyway as she watches a machine move a crate that she could just pick up for them.
(Kay offered. They weren't interested.)
Kay isn't precisely a dangerous obstacle; she is very particular about where she puts her feet and who she interrupts, and she's not really where passengers usually go, as she's been restricted to the cargo zone. But she's certainly not always making it easy for people or lifts and cranes that have to either detour around her or wait for her to move.
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
Mobile suits in ports aren't the strangest thing, though, yes: usually they're being shipped, not piloted. That's why Ruri doesn't think terribly much of there being very tall things, in this cargo dock.
But she has a vague feeling of curiosity, which at first isn't so strange, because she's feeling curious anyway. It's only when she thinks about it that she thinks it's a disparate sort of emotion, alien to her 'self'. The feeling is different, even if it's largely the same.
How strange, Ruri thinks.
Strange enough for her to pick herself up, and wander right into the cargo zone (legally distinct from the twilight zone). This isn't so hard, now that Uribatake's engineers have lost sight of her.
Tragically: Ruri is not a meters-tall robot. Ruri is, in fact, a four-foot-even little girl, and that's why people start yelling real quick.
"Hey, kid! Get out of the way!" With, you know, understandable urgency, given this guy just had to brake his forklift.
Ruri jumps, a little, as she looks over that way. "Oh," she says, still quite even-toned. "Excuse me."
"Don't you have parents keeping an eye on you?! Geez!" Off he goes, only for Ruri to have to get out of the way of some people carrying a slab around, instead.
The cargo zone is a terrible place to be when you're this small!
<Pose Tracker> Kay has posed.
Really, the cargo zone is a terrible place to be when you don't belong in it no matter how big you are. People know where they're going; they have jobs, plans, and very heavy objects.
Kay, for instance, has been largely detoured around, but she's still slowing things down even if people are less likely to yell at someone closer to thirty feet tall than four. As a result she has been mostly boxed in, standing next to some deposited shipping crates (one of which is destined to have its contents find their way onto the Nadesico, but that's another story).
She catches someone shouting at someone small. Kay's visored 'face' turns that way, flickering slightly. It takes her only a moment to recognize her, though she's never seen her in person before; Kay works for (is owned by) Nergal, so it isn't too surprising that she's been shown a database that includes at least some people in similar boats. The uniform helps.
Kay steps away from the crates. She has to stop before she walks into a forklift (which does get her scolded; she freezes up at it, and does not respond for several moments) but continues toward Ruri.
Not that she's sure how to introduce herself. So she doesn't, at first, but looks down towards her. Only after a few moments: "Operator. Are you looking for something?" Kay's voice is synthesized, but a good synthesizer; it would sound natural if it wasn't a little flat at emoting, but that could just be Kay, honestly.
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
Ruri, who is really fairly unflappable as far as children go, doesn't much flinch when a mobile suit clomps on closer to her. She is, indeed, in a Nergal uniform, which is if nothing else an excellent 'if found, please return to --' indicator.
And when that giant addresses her, Ruri looks up, and up, and up, and then up some more. She blinks those big, gold eyes, looking into the visor. She says, finally, voice even as a still pond: "I think I was looking for you."
Her head tilts, just so; one twintail brushes through the air, as the other lands across her face, like the unruly mop of a sheepdog at work. "You're curious about the port, too, aren't you..?" It's a question, ventured out, reaching for confirmation.
She's not entirely sure it's Kay -- even so, Ruri knows she's unlikely to have any sense of a suit's pilot. Which means -- well, one of a few things. She really can't be certain.
<Pose Tracker> Kay has posed.
Kay doesn't have any way to blink or show expression. The machine she is part of doesn't seem like it was designed for a person; it doesn't have a face, only a solid helmet with the opaque green visor, and it doesn't have any of the little movements that most people would have.
Ruri gets more from Kay's body language than most people, of course. There's a bit of surprise there, a bit more of the curiosity. There is plenty of room for a cockpit in there, but Ruri probably wouldn't pick up on it if it was the pilot's...
"I do not need to be on the Dreisstrager right now," Kay says, when Ruri says she was (maybe) looking for her. Which neatly answers where she gets returned to, if lost - but she knows where she is. (She has the Internet and internal mapping. She always knows where she is.) "So if I am needed, they have not contacted me." That Ruri personally might have been looking for her has not crossed her mind.
But... this is one of the first times Kay has ever been asked for her opinion on something that wasn't work-related. She really looks for the words to answer it. Having been 'awake' for only a few weeks, and officially a Super AI for less time than that, Kay still feels like she doesn't really understand conversation well enough to be anything but a little stiff. "I have never seen a port before. I wanted to experience it. I think they do not want me here," she adds, though her flat affect makes it hard to tell if she thinks this is a good thing (she is in the way sometimes, after all) or a bad thing.
"But... I do not think I should go into the rest of the city alone."
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
"Oh," Ruri says, recognition flashing over her face. "You're with the Dreisstrager... I see." She looks a little tense, for a moment, before she reasons with herself that everything she knows indicates nothing about the crew being a problem.
Ruri doesn't have an onboard database in her head, so she didn't know this suit was affiliated with Nergal off the top of her head. She could have asked Omoikane about it, except -- she's not on the Nadesico! Right now, she is just a regular human. With nanomachines. Mostly a regular human.
But this woman wants to experience the port -- well, Ruri can sympathise with that, she thinks, with a nod. When some more of the porters yell at her for getting underfoot, Ruri hurries on closer to Kay's foot, so that she can borrow the suit's personal space. Evidently hers isn't being respected right now! (It's because you're so small, Ruri.)
"It's okay," Ruri assures her, because she definitely has the sense that this is a bit awkward for her. "I haven't seen too many ports before now, either. They're very busy, so I suppose we're in the way, or something like that." Ruri has the sense to sound a little embarrassed by getting underfoot. Just a little, though. She's not terribly emotive, for a human.
"But... are you alone?" Ruri ventures, looking up, even more now she's right underneath her. (Still with zero expectation she'll be squished.) "Isn't there anyone with you?"
<Pose Tracker> Kay has posed.
The only thing Kay knows about Ruri as regards the Dreisstrager is that she visited it not that long ago. And the only reason Kay knows that is because she watches when people dock, because she's nosy. She has no idea what Ruri came for or that she was unhappy when she left, or why that might be. It's a mystery!
Ruri coming closer gives Kay a momentary issue, because she had been about to crouch down so that Ruri didn't have to look up quite so far. It can't be comfortable for her! So she shuffles back, slightly, as if avoiding Ruri, and then kneels down.
She's still way taller than Ruri, of course. It didn't help that much.
"Yes," Kay confirms. "Nobody else came with me. I did not want to ask someone to, and I am technically allowed to travel by myself as long as I return when I am asked to. Should I have come with someone? I was not going to ask Mayvy..."
A pause. It's more awkward than before. "I am Kay," she adds, because she realizes she didn't introduce herself and that's what people do, right? The stiffness is still in her conversation choice, but that at least seems more spontaneous.
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
Ruri isn't sure what to do with the data of Kay shuffling back, at first, so she just sort of pauses where she is, giving Kay the opportunity to kneel down. She's a little confused, but supposes that maybe the suit was tired. Suits can get tired!
Especially when, as it turns out, the suit is people.
For some reason, Ruri was cautious, in her evaluation of what she was feeling. It has everything to do with her quick exit from the Dreisstrager, really -- she even suggested they leave as soon as they were all loaded up, which is strange, because Ruri rarely expresses opinions about that sort of thing.
But here, she reaches out, to pat a hand against -- well, one section of Kay's knee. It's a very large knee and she's a very small Ruri, but the physical contact is helpful, when trying to connect with strangers. Not, strictly speaking, necessary -- but helpful. (It might be an entirely psychological thing, given she's always been in contact with her systems. So, too, does it say interesting things about her touch aversion around other humans. Let's examine those things... never!)
Her internal ping to Kay is, of course, the classic: Hello, world! It is a warm and welcoming salutation.
Externally, she says: "I'm Ruri," with the sort of pause which suggests that she forgot, just the same. "I... guess I'm technically allowed too," she adds, hand pulling back to clasp near her heart. "Um, that is, I didn't ask anyone, so they didn't say no." Technically speaking, not being disallowed is KIND of like being allowed.
That's the sort of lying Ruri is best at!
"I think it's fine to go where you want, so long as you're not hurting anyone," she supposes, because that last statement was dangerously close to not being responsible, which clearly Ruri is. "But it's not like asking for help understanding the rules is bad, either."
<Pose Tracker> Kay has posed.
"I just did not want to bother her. She has already given me an office," Kay says, which sounds slightly like a non sequitor unless you're Kay. "She has other jobs than me. I am supposed to help her." Though, knowing the rules would be helpful.
Once she's kneeling, Kay considers her other options. It would be convenient (for Ruri) (she thinks, anyway) if they weren't quite so different in size. Unfortunately she hasn't exactly mastered the art of size changing, so she does the second best thing:
She holds her hand flat, parallel to the ground. With the size difference, it probably would make a decent seat, though standing on it might be hard (balance reasons more than anything else).
Kay just holds it still, giving Ruri plenty of time (or not). What she wasn't expecting is physical contact combined with an internal ping. It's not that Kay has never been pinged before, but she certainly hasn't been contacted by a human not using any equipment she can see.
< !! >
Kay's response doesn't really make it to words - it is just surprise, but not in a negative sense - a pleasant surprise rather than a painful or distasteful one. Ruri can feel Kay in there, and something else - like there's a second, secondary computer that isn't awake, along with her, who is, and the two are connected deeply. She feels... complex, but not in the same way as most Super AIs. She was not designed as one - honestly, it makes her closer to Omoikane in some ways than, say, GGG's very deliberately created Super AIs.
< ?? > she emits, a sense of confusion. It's not the physical contact that confused her. "Who are you?" she asks again, even though she already has that answer. She must not be allowed to read Nergal's secret files, or she would know.
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
"If she says you're a bother, tell her she's a fool," is Ruri's sage advice. "Anyway, I don't think Mayvy-san," she borrows from another language entirely to keep a little distance even on a first-name basis, "is the sort of person to treat anyone like equipment. If she knows you're interested, I'm sure she'd help."
There might be something to that reassurance which is concerning, but Ruri thinking first to assure someone else they're not just equipment is another thing to examine some other time. Like, a theoretical other time. Infinity hours away.
Kay's surprise comes through loud and clear, though, even when Ruri isn't in contact with her. She doesn't hesitate to clamber onto her palm, though it is QUITE a trip up for her, given she is twelve, and has never suffered through the indignities of PE class. (She graduated from a more fragile grade.) Luckily, the trip from pinky to palm does, eventually, work out for Ruri, though she kind of ends up scooting the rest of the way to her palm on her hands and knees.
Ruri isn't foolish enough to stand up in this environment, so it's fine!
Her hands flat to Kay's one, massive hand, Ruri transmits reassurance -- reassurance that she did feel something, that she is here, that she's making herself present in the data Kay is receiving.
"I'm... a bridge, I suppose," Ruri adopts Asciel's language, again, as she struggles to explain. She doesn't know the half of it. "I'm human, but I can reach electronics... um," she starts, pausing, as she tries to figure out just how to explain herself. She decides on the explanation which hews closest to available data. "Are you familiar with Newtypes? Humans who can reach the hearts of other humans? I don't know how other humans are feeling, but I understand you, Ms. Kay."
Ruri pauses, and adds, a hint of anxiety in the data she's pinging back to her: "Is that all right? I know it's quite a lot." Kay seems receptive to her presence, but Ruri knows how she felt when she learned empathy was a thing. She doesn't want to make her uncomfortable!
<Pose Tracker> Kay has posed.
It helps that Kay isn't quite so big as a mobile suit. They're half again as big as her, or more; while she's enormous compared to Ruri (and not in the same way that half the crew of the Nadesico is much bigger than her), she's not quite as hard to climb up and on.
It's still awkward, mind. It's just that it could be worse.
Ruri may not want to examine the whole concept of not being equipment, but it's something that has been on Kay's mind lately and she will not be offput by the conversation simply becoming awkward. She doesn't entirely 'get', deep down, that it will be.
"She said that as well," Kay agrees. "Have you spoken to her about it?" She can't imagine why, but based on the way Ruri refers to Mayvy, they do know each other. Which, if they're both in science on Nergal vessels, makes sense. (So is Kay, after all, and now she knows both of them...) "She asked if I had been treated that way." A moment, then: "I have not since I came to the Dreisstrager," which is probably as best an explanation as she can give.
Raising Ruri up for a more convenient conversational height, Kay begins to walk, because a path has cleared. She's not going far - she's just getting more out of the way of the general traffic route - and she is extremely thoughtful about keeping her hand as steady as she can. It's a smoother ride than it looks like it should be.
"I have heard about that, but I don't know how humans are feeling either." There's an undertone of - something there, something controlled that goes away faster than Ruri can really analyze it. "It is fine. I ...am new. I am not good at talking like people yet. I am trying to learn better now that I think I am one," she assures Ruri, which is a very weird way to phrase things and yet also completely accurate.
Discomfort does not seem to be entering the picture. There's more of a faint feeling of interest and excitement.
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
"Not about this," Ruri says, and thinks to make it clear: "but we have talked before. I'm happy no one's treated you poorly on the Dreisstrager." There's something missing, something unspoken, in that phrase, because --
Well, how is Ruri supposed to ask how Kay lives with that empty void where a person should be, when she seems like she's doing better on that ship? Perhaps it has something to do with that partition, or whatever it was Ruri felt, but is it something she can ask about without putting her in danger..?
She appreciates how smooth the ride is, though. She still doesn't try to stand up, but it's mostly about making the trip easy on Kay. Ruri is perfectly comfortable conversing with an inhuman visor, because most of her best conversations are with text boxes, after all.
Ruri settles back, legs to one side underneath her, as she considers Kay's explanation. "You only just started asking, didn't you..?" She prompts, and after a few moments thinks to clarify her own incomplete understanding of personhood. "Welcome. Omoikane wasn't always curious, either. No one really expected him to be a person... so, I was able to hide us. I guess... you didn't have anyone with you," she realises, gently, as she makes the connection.
"Is Nergal-san treating you all right?" Ruri asks, and now she's nervous for another reason. "If you're in trouble, I'll help you. Though," she adds, a hand lifting to grasp at her opposite wrist, "I guess the biggest thing you want help with isn't something I'm very good at... I don't really understand how to talk to other humans."
She offers reinforcement and encouragement, wordlessly, deliberately. Ruri can't be so gloomy around someone like this! "But that's not to say it's impossible, or anything like that," she insists, shaking her head. "Omoikane has a particular way of talking, but he's very good at communicating his feelings." The fact that Ruri is biased in no way factors into her appraisal. "I'm a stubborn person, but a good girl like you should be able to learn very quickly." She sounds pretty confident that Kay is good, which -- well, be fair, she's cheating.
"I'm feeling -- I'm feeling..." Ruri was going to explain, except she gets to the offer and stumbles over it, looking down. Wordlessly, she expresses what she's feeling, transmitting her anxiety -- and the excitement underneath it, too, coupled the relief. Very little of it shows on the stoic mask of her face. Nevertheless, it is a deep well. "I'm worried about you," Ruri decides how to say it, after a pause a few beats too long, "because I know how computers are treated sometimes. But I'm really quite happy to meet someone who's happy to meet me... it hasn't always gone too well for me, recently. Talking to you feels so familiar, too... I guess that's why I thought you were like Omoikane." Ruri pauses, and asks: "Does that make sense?"
<Pose Tracker> Kay has posed.
Kay has only been on the Dreisstrager for a few days. Perhaps there simply hasn't been enough time for her to encounter all its secrets. She isn't Ruri, after all; she doesn't reflexively connect to other machines like she does.
Or maybe they just asked her not to talk about them. Eitheror. She seems unworried about it for now... she is comfortable on the Dreisstrager, where they actually seem to accept her. Unlike some other places she could still be.
'You've only just started asking, didn't you?'
"Four weeks ago," Kay says, before adding, "And two days, seven hours, forty-three minutes. But I only was tested to be classified as a Super AI some time after that. Nobody expected me to be a person, either. But I thought about it, while I was working, and the first thing I thought was: 'I want to be a person'. Then I thought that I must be, or I would not have thought about it. But there is a lot to learn about it."
She falls quiet for a moment. "Nergal is... They own the machinery I am attached to." Does she mean the robot? Or something else? "I am not in trouble. I am happy to work on the Dreisstrager." Well, there's that. "Nobody has ever worried about me before, except Mayvy..." Kay is not sure how to put it, but she is very glad to have met Ruri; the feeling she has makes that clear. She is more comfortable talking to her than she has been with other people, even as she wanted to talk to them.
So Ruri is relieved, but Kay is excited, even if she has no mouth to smile and doesn't raise her voice all that much.
Omoikane? "If I am like him, I would like to talk to Omoikane," Kay decides, after a few more moments. "If I am allowed. Is Omoikane not the computer on the Nadesico?" Kay has heard the name but was not aware that it - he, too, was a Super AI. "Not now, because he is not here. But I could send a message."
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
So, Kay is a little over a month old, Ruri reflects. "I'm twelve years old," she says, "and Omoikane is seven." No wonder she's a font of wisdom in this conversation!
Comparatively.
"I see," she nods, as she listens to her situation with the company. "I'm not in too different a position, since Nergal paid for my education." It's a nice way to phrase it. It's what they wrote on her file, after all! "But Mayvy-san is a kind person, I think."
Ruri doesn't advise Kay to trust or not trust Mayvy either way, though. She understands it's a difficult situation, sometimes. But she can tell Kay her opinion of the woman.
It's fine for Kay to not be too visually expressive, because Ruri isn't too expressive, either, but she can express herself to Kay, and she can feel how Kay is feeling. She likes talking to computers so much more than people. This is so much better.
She thinks it's entirely reasonable for computers to want to talk to each other, too. "That's okay. I set up a safe corridor," implying Kay isn't even the first one to ask, "so we should be able to receive your connection without causing any security issues." Ruri is the systems operator! She does do sysop things. "I'm sure Omoikane would like to talk to you, too."
He did think it was very nice, the way Minae got to grow up around Super AI. Ruri thinks he must be a little lonely, even though she's always been here, because Ruri is still a person, not a computer. Ruri knows what it's like, to not have anyone like you, so she wants Omoikane to make lots of friends like him, too.
<Pose Tracker> Kay has posed.
Kay would agree with Ruri's read of Mayvy. She was good to Kay, and really that's the only measure she has at this point - but she didn't have to be, and so that she was means something.
"I will send him a message," Kay promises. And she will. "And I will send you a message, too. I have never gotten a message from outside, so I do not know how easy it will be to send me one, but if I initiate a communications link it should not be a problem." Kay isn't a comms officer but she certainly has computer access.
Kay likes Ruri. Ruri makes sense, which is good; Kay wants to learn more about people, but there's no shame in starting with a person who can understand you better than the average. Is that what all human communication is? Connection...? It seems that way. It certainly isn't purely data transfer, given how often people are not correct.
Kay very carefully sets Ruri down on the ground, crouching to do it. And then - she offers her hand angled differently.
"I should return shortly. So, before that, it is appropriate to shake hands to make the agreement," she says, though Ruri can figure out that her 'tone of voice' (such as it is) is making it a bit of an uncertain question. She must have heard about shaking hands at one point...
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
It's not so different to the way Ruri's decided she likes the Nadesico, really. They treated her like a full, flawed person, for the first time in her life. Things like that mean something!
"Nergal has a networking system," Ruri says, "so we can talk when we're not close by, so long as the Minovsky interference isn't too bad." She pauses, and adds, still quite neutral: "But if it is, we'd have bigger things to worry about, I guess."
NOTE: Minovsky particles are usually given off by weapons.
The little girl is deadpanning aside the fact that they get stuck in active battle situations.
More things to examine never!
Ruri scooches her way to the edge of Kay's hand once she's lowered down, and slowly dangles her feet to the ground. "Oof," she says, at the landing, which may well be the most human display of spontaneous expression she's shown all day. But she's fine! She's not delicate!
(Okay, she's a little delicate, but she's still the sturdiest one.)
And Kay angles her hand, and Ruri reaches out to grasp both of hers around one of her fingers. This is as close as she can get to a proper handshake, probably. "It's nice to meet you, Miss Kay," Ruri says, which is a slight alteration on her title, because Ruri knows she's young too, now. "Let's talk again."
Ruri doesn't smile, but she transmits her feelings of warmth for Kay's benefit, anyway.
She might even be able to sneak back onto the Nadesico before anyone's realised she's gone!
(NOT SHOWN: Helmswoman Erina Kinjo Won, currently demanding to know where their systems operator is, because it's been ten whole minutes.)
Anyway, it will be totally fine, because Ruri's made a new friend.