2023-11-20: An Answer Better Than Maybe
- Log: An Answer Better Than Maybe
- Cast: Naoko Suzuki, Shari Loom
- Where: Yalafath Island, Orb Union
- OOC - IC Date: 0097-11-20
- Summary: While investigating the nature of the flowers planted by the Kafims, Naoko is approached by Shari, and shares a little bit more than she meant to regarding her ideas regarding the circumstances her fellow Whispered is trapped by. In other words: Shari gets to meet some Friends!
<Pose Tracker> Naoko Suzuki has posed.
Ten days ago, the capital of the United Emirates of Orb was shaken by an invasion force of one, appearing out of nowhere. The sudden appearance ultimately being among the less alarming things about it, between the damage and the frightening powers brought to bear, only definable as 'magic'. And in its wake, an ominous, indestructible black flower. Right in the middle of the street, forcing the authorities of Olofat to cordon off the area and redirect traffic.
One wonders if the residents have already gotten used to it as a mere inconvenience. If they've already managed to move on, and think little else of this new permanent fixture of the city. Some might even find it pretty.
Naoko Suzuki believes quite the opposite. There's absolutely no way there isn't anything more to these flowers Elisa and Yuliana Kafim have been planting all over. She hasn't been able to discern a pattern between the locations, but that's not her specialty, anyway. She's interested in the nature of these plants. What they're made of - are they even actually plants at all? - and especially, any sort of correlation between them and the diverse manifestations of Void energy that she's been recording. It's kind of fascinating, but... this isn't idle curiosity. If there's going to be trouble, she'd like to be prepared, if she can. More importantly... the more she knows about the Void, the better the odds of coming up with ways to combat it.
To that end, the Sukeban has parked itself in an elevated, uninhabited area of Yalafath Island, with a good long-distance view of the offending flower. Works plenty well for data gathering purposes, and prevents any difficult questions she might get if she did this in the city itself. Even though the Arm Slave's presence is quite obvious, for those who care to look. Purple on green, it's never any less bad of a camouflage. Not that she's actively trying to hide, there's no need, being a known Friendly to the 3SA base in the area.
Knelt down, the Arm Slave stands slightly less than its normal 8 meters. Its cockpit has been left open, leaving Naoko clearly visible, lazily splayed out across the seat, staring at the rapid scrolling of a holographic screen. Gathering the data isn't the interesting part of this. She'll only get to have fun with the analysis, after the machine's done what it can. Her mouth opens in a large yawn, loudly proclaiming her obvious opinion on the current situation.
"Booooooriiiiing!"
<Pose Tracker> Shari Loom has posed.
Ten days ago, the capital was assaulted... Elisa's home. Shari Loom finds herself uneasy about it, when she thinks about it--and unfortunately, here in Orb, she does have to think some about it.
But she was also supposed to observe from a distance, and when she was observing, she spotted the Sukeban in its... very, very hidden state. Super hidden. Totally hidden.
...
"Hup--!"
Shari finishes climbing the elevated area and pulls herself up near the Arm Slave, looking over at Naoko as she observes. She steps around until she can see her better, and then waves.
"What are you doing?" she wonders.
"Other than being bored."
She's dressed in ordinary athletic type clothes, with some dust from all the walking and climbing on her tennis shoes.
<Pose Tracker> Naoko Suzuki has posed.
Aaaaand Naoko flings herself right over the back of her seat in surprise. Quite the accomplishment, really, when she isn't normally athletic at all. It just takes the right motivation! Wait no, that's not the right word. Mortification, that's the one.
On her feet again in short order, she recovers by means of turning it around on Shari, pointing an accusatory finger down from her, for once, impressively high position by comparison.
"What am I doing? What are you doing? ...here? Right now, when am I here too??"
Kind of funny how well she improvises in battle, when outside of it she's floundering like a fish out of water. This is, of course, because she feels like one, in most any unplanned social situation.
Realizing she's freaking out, she clears her throat, trying to save face and hoping they can just pretend that didn't happen. "...I'm running an analysis. With the software I wrote. On the flower, down there. That was left by your 'aunt'." Good job Naoko, you did it, you summed it up.
Considering the way Shari's 'aunt' left, she can't help but wonder out loud, "...Was she... okay, after that? She kind of, uh... melted into goop."
<Pose Tracker> Shari Loom has posed.
Shari, on the other hand, is athletic enough to get here from the bottom on foot! And she lifts an eyebrow once Naoko points down at her. "I'm snooping on you," she answers simply, and enjoys the chance to feel 'cool' by comparison.
It's a good feeling.
But then, "Oh. Find anything interesting?" Shari wonders, walking the rest of the way over to peer down at the flower from this high vantage point. The question, though...
"Uh." Pause. "Yeah that's not usually how she teleports," Shari admits. "The rumor around base goes that She got her out, instead of my aunt getting out the usual way."
<Pose Tracker> Naoko Suzuki has posed.
Naoko would barely get off the ground before starting to wonder why she should bother with it when she has a giant robot. Who would ever be physically active for fun, it's awful. Speaking of awful.
"Y-you're what??" Naoko also wants to be cool! She isn't doing a very good job at it. You can't tell her you're snooping and not expect her to get distressed. "Why?! I'm not doing anything suspicious! I-If it looks suspicious to you, then... then you should be less suspicious!" Really batting a thousand with these comebacks.
She can at least calm down a bit when talking about her Actually Non-Suspicious activities. "I dunno yet. That's what's boring, I gotta let the software collect everything and do a few sorting and pruning passes, so I'm not wasting my time with the irrelevant stuff. That's why I write my own, conventional data collection software is useless."
Well, it is when you do most of the analysis yourself, manually, instead of letting a computer also do that. But that's the fun part, why would you take that away from yourself?
Shari's assessment on what happened with Elisa gives her pause, for a moment. Then, she hops out of the cockpit, using the Sukeban's arm as a slide. The one exception to the rule, it at least makes her look a little athletic. It's something she's done so many times, she knows exactly how to position the arm so she can have a quick and smooth ride down.
Once on ground level, she turns to face the flower from there as well. "...They're probably right. Elisa called on Her, and did... something." It's always hard to describe these things. But there's another reason why she didn't notice much of it, which she turns to Shari to relay with a measure of excitement. "I was fine, I'm pretty sure She didn't see me. I hid myself in time. I knew it was possible, I told you!"
<Pose Tracker> Shari Loom has posed.
"You're really easy to spot from the ground," Shari points out. "On account of your camouflage being not-ouflage." It's a word. It's fine.
"Oh..." She nods. "That makes sense," Shari says, since the idea of making her own stuff for technology of course makes perfect sense to her. Not that she uses much data collection software but it's the principle of the thing.
Still, as Naoko slides down, Shari is forced to admit internally that that was pretty cool, actually. It shows in her face, even if she doesn't say it.
"Hmm..." Shari nods along, thinking--until Naoko says she was fine. "Wait, really?" Shari asks. "I mean--are you sure She wasn't just busy focusing on Elisa instead of on you? You really did... something?"
<Pose Tracker> Naoko Suzuki has posed.
Naoko doesn't continue trying to fight a losing battle. As much as she wants to say that if she wanted to hide, she'd have hidden better. Which probably isn't true anyway, stealth isn't even in the top ten of things she thinks about where it comes to things a robot should be good at.
She's glad to be able to show off at least a little bit, though. If it was up to her she'd just only ever be doing the things she's good at, so she can be cool all the time. Not her fault that it never works out that way, the world needs to learn to be more considerate and throw its curveballs somewhere else.
This subject, though, this is where it becomes really interesting. "Yeah! I do it all the time, probably, I mean, I don't really think about it. I just, uhhh..."
There is a long, awkward pause. She just kind of started talking, without any idea of where she was going to go. And now she ran into a corner, where the only good way she could explain it would be to talk about things that she's trying to keep secret as much as possible. But she can't just leave Shari hanging, this is pretty much the most important thing, that she promised to deliver on. Is there any way to carefully navigate this...?
"...I have this early warning system," is what she eventually settles on. "It lets me know when I'm in danger, from, you know... mental stuff. It protects me from it too, kind of... something I can hide behind, with my mind? But it's not perfect. I do need to actively turn away from it, you have to not want to let it in. ...And I have to admit, I don't know how well it would have worked if there hadn't been other people to focus on, too. But, believe me. I know it works."
Naoko... thinks she did pretty okay, dancing around the heart of the subject. Though it's rather obvious that she's trying to hide something.
<Pose Tracker> Shari Loom has posed.
Coolness...
Long, awkward pause. Shari just kind of inhabits the awkwardness, since she's not the one who has to figure out what to say. Instead, she waits! And then....
"Hmm..." Mental stuff. "An early warning system, huh? So you've got that?"
Shari doesn't inquire into the worst details immediately--instead, "Well, I'm glad you have a way to. I don't really want to see you with Her hooks in you, you know? So that's... good."
She seems a little disappointed, somehow. But she paves over it quickly, "Anyway... Got any theories so far?"
<Pose Tracker> Naoko Suzuki has posed.
Oh no. Naoko catches onto that disappointment more than anything, immediately back to falling over herself trying to reword things.
"I-I didn't mean it like that! God, I must sound like... like I'm lording it over you, or something. That's not at all what I'm trying to say, I just mean there's something I have to go off of, like an approach that should work, if I can find a way to duplicate it somehow."
...That's implying that she doesn't even know how it works, that isn't any better, gah! Naoko facepalms at her own ineptitude in saying what she wants to say. ...No, she knows exactly what she can say, she just doesn't think she should be honest. ...And now what she's doing sounds even worse.
This is hopeless. Shari's never going to believe in her like this. Why should she believe in someone who won't be completely honest?
"...Maybe I can demonstrate. Uriel. Ariel."
No reaction, of course. They're saying quiet, but if they could sweat, that's what they would be doing right now. It's rare that they don't think sharing their existence with others is a bad idea.
Naoko casually flicks her hand against her right braid, forceful enough to knock the black butterfly hairclip off of it. But before it hits the ground, its wings animate, and it flutters back up to eye height with Naoko.
>"What the hell are you doing?!"<
Shari can definitely hear that. She might recall a brief instance when she heard that voice of a young boy come out of nowhere before, yelling 'stop', moments before Naoko ran into her on the streets of Magallanica.
"I'm telling her the truth," Naoko calmly replies.
>"That's something you should mention beforehand, I didn't agree to this!"<
"You never do, you're pretty disagreeable, you know that?"
Distracted by their argument, they don't even notice Naoko's white hairclip absconding on its own, the other butterfly flitting over to Shari, speaking in a little girl's voice.
>"Sorry about those two. I'm Ariel. Nice to meet you, Shari."<
<Pose Tracker> Shari Loom has posed.
"Oh." Shari pauses, and looks over Naoko--but before she can say more, Naoko is facepalming and troubling herself and sounding less sure than ever. "Right..."
But she can demonstrate, to start. Then, she hears it--the voice, along with the butterfly hairclip.
"Uh?" Shari starts, and blinks a few times. She looks to the hairclip, and back to Naoko. She does remember the voice...
They are arguing, now, and Shari finds herself talking to a white hairclip instead. It flits to her, and...
"Um..."
"I'm not hallucinating, right?" she confirms, and looks over the butterfly. "...Pretty," she comments.
"Um, it's nice to meet you, too. It's fine. Apparently your buddy doesn't approve..."
<Pose Tracker> Naoko Suzuki has posed.
It's an Experience, alright. To Naoko, this is obviously completely normal. She's even started smiling a little. Like she's enjoying the argument with this... flying hairclip.
>"How many times do I need to tell you, the more people know, the more danger you'll be in!"<
"I'm not worried. You'll keep me safe, won't you?"
>"I'm a freaking butterfly, what am I gonna do?"<
"Complain a lot, probably."
...This could go on for a while, as Ariel well knows. Getting out of the way and talking to Shari is a welcome alternative. >"Nope!"< is the simple reply to whether this is an hallucination. She does a little twirl in the air, as if this would somehow serve as proof. And oooh, she's called pretty?!
>"Aw, thank you! I like this body a lot!"<
Shari can probably deduce from there that these are actually AIs, being housed in the hairclips. Considering their natural conversational tone, their level of advancement is decidedly unusual for shells that small, to put it mildly.
>"Oh, don't mind Uriel, he's a sourpuss. He'll come around."<
>"No I freaking won't!"<
Naoko grabs Uriel out of the air, prompting a waterfall of mild insults that she completely ignores.
"So yeah. Now you know. These are my friends, they help keep things out of my head. And are very pleasant conversationalists, as a bonus!"
>"Dumbass! Idiot! Airhead!"<
"Those all mean the same thing, find some better material."
<Pose Tracker> Shari Loom has posed.
It explains a few things for Shari. This whole experience.
Shari doesn't butt into the argument; instead she talks to the butterfly, who is twirling now. "You're welcome," Shari answers. She can indeed deduce that about the hairclips being AIs. Which is definitely a big deal. But then...
If Naoko's like her, then...
"It's cool if he doesn't. I am kinda dangerous," Shari admits. "Since I'm involved in all this other stuff..." She frowns a little, and then there's--
"Ahahah. I always liked 'dork', if that helps," she offers Uriel, and then looks back to Naoko a little more seriously. "Your 'early warning system', huh...?"
"I guess having somebody else around makes sense as an option. Do you think maybe She can't see them because they're AIs? I'm not sure if that's how it works, but..."
She looks between the hairclips again. "This is pretty cool, I gotta admit. Nice friends."
<Pose Tracker> Naoko Suzuki has posed.
Ariel is quick to fly back and forth in front of Shari's face, emulating a headshake.
>"That has nothing to do with you. You're just Shari. You're nice."<
Also, pretty simple-minded, for AIs. But earnest. Like children. This also probably explains a few things, about why Naoko is the way she is. Speaking of which, when she addresses Uriel--
>"Thank you, yes, a dork, that's what you are!"<
"And what are you, a parrot? Come up with your own stuff!"
It really is striking how when it's Uriel saying it, suddenly Naoko has a comeback for everything. Her level of comfort with these 'friends' of hers is on an entirely different level than where it comes to people.
She lets Uriel go free, after that, and she stretches out her hands, palms up. The two butterflies circle Naoko for a moment, then each lands on the hand that's on the side they usually rest in her hair. There was never any actual animosity from Uriel, everything about this was just... normal interaction.
"...I felt bad calling them that," she admits, now that she can be honest. "They're much more than that, to me. And... I didn't want to lie about it. You deserve to know. And, you know. Didn't want you to think I was just making stuff up just to make you feel better."
The problem is... well, like she implied already, she doesn't know how they work. "I don't think that's it, not all of it, anyway. It's something to do with... how they interact with me. I figure, that has to mean the same interaction is possible with you." ...But there's only the two of them. And she hasn't worked out how, or if, it's possible to create more of them. And she can't, really...
"...Would you like to borrow one of them?"
Her eyes grow wide, shocked at her own words, how readily she made that offer.
The two butterflies, for their part, are stunned, before, naturally, Uriel objects first.
>"Absolutely not! What are you thinking? If you do that, you'll--"<
Naoko, eyes closed, interrupts him. "I know, I know, alright?! But, what am I supposed to do? If something happens, when I could have done something..."
<Pose Tracker> Shari Loom has posed.
It's night and day to see Naoko with these two. ...But it's nice, when Ariel says that. Shari opens her mouth and closes it again. "...Thanks," she says, a little uneasily, because it's so nice that it feels...
Well, at least she's getting along with Uriel kind of?
"I didn't mean anything by it," Shari says of calling them AIs. "They're obviously more than just programs." She pauses. "...I appreciate that. I remember when I said you were full of shit," the pink-haired girl answers, "So... I'm glad you're being straight with me."
But that's not all of it. The interactions... "Hrm. So you think..."
Pause. "Whoa, whoa--"
Shari blinks. That's a huge step. She's pretty shocked by it, too. But--Even so--
"I, um--" Shari hesitates, and actually looks to panic a little. "No, I mean, I--"
She stops, and takes a breath. "...That's really cool of you to offer. But I'm not gonna put you at risk for a 'maybe'. If it doesn't work, and my aunts find out you tried..."
She hesitates. "...Besides, I..."
She looks out over the flower again, turning.
"..."
"It gathers energy," she says. "That's what you should focus your analysis on."
Shari turns back to Naoko. "I um... I need to--"
She starts to head for the edge of the clearing.
<Pose Tracker> Naoko Suzuki has posed.
Naoko can't help but smile. There's something very enjoyable about seeing someone else interact with her friends like this, for once. She only wishes she could do it more often. But she does agree that it's a risk they probably shouldn't take. The wrong people might develop an interest in these AIs, especially once they figure out the important aspects that she hasn't mentioned.
She'd even have to agree that it's probably not a good idea to share it with Shari, given who she's associated with. Looking back on it later, she'll have trouble figuring out why she did that, let alone go that far in what she offered. Helping others in need is important to her, yes. But to such great detriment to herself...?
It doesn't come that far, however. Shari's mild panic is a mirror to Naoko's own, though she doesn't understand why, exactly. "I don't..." she begins, but trails off. She isn't quite sure what she was going to say there. But it feels like any claims in favor of her offer would involve saying that she isn't worried, afraid of what might happen. And that would absolutely would be a lie.
The only thing she might have been able to say, had she been able to get herself to, is along the lines of 'this isn't about your aunts'. But she doesn't have Ariel's courage, to speak about her feelings that openly.
In the end, she blinks, blankly, at the sudden hint regarding the flower. What if your aunts find out about that, Shari? She won't think of those words until later. At this time, Naoko only wears a baffled expression, until Shari abruptly makes to leave.
"Huh? But... Shari, I---"
She doesn't get beyond the first step she took, before Uriel and Ariel leave their perches, to flutter in front of Naoko. She could easily get by, of course. But that unified, wordless action informs that there's something she's missing, and they think she should back off. She doesn't always listen, but in this case... she doesn't pursue. She only reiterates her promise.
"...I won't give up, until I have an answer." Hopefully, an answer better than a 'maybe'.