2024-02-24: Leina's Optimism
- Log: Leina's Optimism
- Cast: Yuliana Kafim, Leina Ashta
- Where: The Photon Power Labs
- Date: 2024-03-24 (ICly August 0098)
- Summary: Leina visits Yuliana at the PPL's gym, to talk with her about her family and Elisa. Yuliana tells Leina all about her nephews and her attempts to build a family, while Leina tells Yuliana about her experiences in Asticassia so far, but Yuliana only skirts around her inability to discuss her relationship... before she learns that Banagher wanted Leina to stop talking to her, after her actions in Sri Lanka. She turns her attention to Leina, then -- and makes some attempt to comfort her after she learns what happened. Yuliana doesn't examine her own negative influence on Leina in the process.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
It's late August, now -- and even though Yuliana took the first chance she got to go home to her wife after her first course of Photon Neuromodulation Therapy, she's back here again. (It took her a while; she spent longer than usual back with her wife. But of course she had to spend more time with Elisa; Elisa missed her so much.) Her first appointment is with Dr. Noburu Kimura, the doctor who spearheaded that project. They sit together in a room; Yuliana, naturally, gets the seat closest the door. This isn't always the best configuration, but in her case, she's proven far more likely to want to get out of a situation.
"... but there were no big side effects or anything after I left. No, it was good," she says, tucking her hair behind an ear. (Her frills are tucked away, too.) "I got to see my wife, and the kids... I'm a lot happier."
"And how have you been going with your nephews?" Dr. Kimura asks, as he scribbles something down.
"Good, good -- Makar turned five recently, so of course we had a wonderful party. I haven't lost my patience with them or anything... I mean, my mother handles a lot of their day-to-day things, but it's been fine, I think. They're just children, so they're really occupied in their own world. Their schooling -- and we just finished a new indoor playground, you know. They're quite fond of that." Yuliana doesn't exactly know that Dr. Kimura is judging her on good enough parenting rather than good parenting, but luckily for her, it's much easier to be good enough.
He nods, and gestures her on. "How has your patience been, generally?"
"Uh -- a lot better, actually," Yuliana says, tilting her head. "You know, I was building a machine with my Elisa, except my hands were getting cold so I ended up dropping this really fiddly part which bent irrevocably, and -- I wanted to hit myself? But then I did the breathing stuff and I didn't." She sounds terribly proud of herself for that, and for once in her life it might even be warranted. "Anyway, it was fine! We ordered another. It's not like we have any need to deploy right now, I just -- like working on them. I like the models too, of course, but there's something about working at scale that really can't be beat."
"I'm glad to hear you've been connecting with your interests," Dr. Kimura smiles. "And congratulations on using Dr. Mikamura's techniques. How have you been sleeping?"
"Well, I still don't Visit so often," she picks her sensitive little euphemism for her audiences with the Empress, which couldn't really be called dreams. "It happened once when I was back home... but it's the same as it was, you know, She's just still terribly anxious." Yuliana frowns, lacing her hands in her lap, her tentacles coming up to cover them. "But even though I've been sleeping longer hours, I've had more nightmares, too... the usual sort of thing." The other laboratories she's been associated with, she means.
"We were expecting that," Dr. Kimura reminds her, gently, "but we can give you medicine to help you sleep, if you find you need it." He pauses, for a moment, and then asks: "Is there anything else I can help you with, Yuliana?"
"No -- no, I don't suppose so," Yuliana says, a hand curling at her chest. "But, I'm grateful."
"Then I'll let you go so you can get settled in," he says, with an open-palmed gesture.
And so we come to Yuliana, strolling down the hall towards the PPL's gym, hands buried in the pockets of her jeans. She's got a real denim bit going on today with the stone-washed vest she's wearing over her white tank top; the blue and purple scarf tied about her neck is light and breezy. It's still far too hot to be wearing much more, though Yuliana, luckily, isn't suffering too much in the middle of Japanese summer. (She grew up in Indonesia, after all, where the seasons are less 'summer' and 'winter' than 'hot and wet' and 'hot and dry'.) ... her tentacles are listing a little as they hang behind her, though.
The poor dears get so stressed in the heat.
<Pose Tracker> Leina Ashta has posed.
There's a tiny knock at the door frame a few minutes after Yuliana leaves, as a young woman shows herself at Dr. Kimura's door.
She's wearing a long off-white floral printed skirt with of Korean design, and a loose dark orange blouse, with a pair of comfortable looking sandals, and a small purse with magical girl motifs in it's design.
She's sporting her best smile as she asks, "Hello Doctor. Got a minute?"
-=-=-
It was all good news.
"Alright. Optimism. Cautious optimism. ... Very cautious. Cautious cautious cautious."
Was she psyching herself up? Probably.
She still had to, after all, she was skirting - no let's just call it what it is - very much crossing a line here, trying to help Yuliana while being a part of Cathedra.
Unfortunately the Doctor's assessment didn't give her the details she really wanted to know, about Yuliana's state of being.
And so now she's heading to the gym, after a quick stop by her room. She could have changed already, but-
Well part of the purpose of this exercise for her was exposure too. She had to be exposed to... various circumstances, of what people might think, might say.
It isn't easy. Her nerves were almost as high for that as for - what she really wanted to assess about Yuliana's current... marital status.
And status definitely meant more than just the fact she was.
Leina stops just inside the gym, trying to spy Yuliana with her gym bag over her arm, and raises her volume subtly just in case of earbuds for workout music- "Hey Yuli. How's the workout going?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Once she reaches the gym, Yuliana quite cheerfully takes one of the barbells and examines the 20kg slotted on, ten to either side...
... and takes those weights off, and adds 25kg to either side, instead.
... and then she adds another set of 25kg plates to that.
... and another...
... until there are four of those plates on either side of the barbell. She collars both sides, and grins, as she sets the barbell down on its rack. "Great!"
She's taking it easy. This counts as taking it easy.
And so Leina finds her, benching that weight -- quite cheerfully, with an easy brisk rhythm, and without much trouble whatsoever. She's distracted, but when Leina raises her voice -- "?" Yuliana grunts, as she looks over, and grins, hefting the weight up to hook it on the rack. She pulls herself out from under it, reaches up to remove her headphones... and then reaches down to remove teeny-tiny headphones from the sides of the horrible little snake-hands to either side of her.
THEY DON'T EVEN HAVE EARS.
"Haa, Leyasha!" She smiles, breathing a little heavily. "It's going quite well... since Sayaka's people don't like me operating at full capacity in here, I just have to go a little faster to get a proper workout going." Whatever Yuliana's full capacity is, it apparently exceeds 200kg of weight. Perhaps it's best not to think about that one too much.
"Have you been well?" She asks, looking up to her. "I just got in last night, so I've not heard much..." She does tend to arrive here at night; even in a stealth shuttle, she's mindful to travel in ways which don't attract attention. Small mercies, particularly given the risks Leina's taking.
<Pose Tracker> Leina Ashta has posed.
Leina's never not surprised about how much a Cyber Newtype can lift. It puts things into perspective how easy it would be if one lost one's temper.
Many things in Leina Ashta's life have driven that fact home.
She is in anger management - with children in the household, but Leina does perhaps, wonder about that.
She does note the earbuds on the snakes, because she didn't realize they had ears??? Useful facts to know!
"It might just be that noone can properly spot for you when you're going all out." Leina points out, with a smile, as she steps further into the gym, towards her. Before she notes, "Well enough - I'm enjoying the summer break from school."
She certainly can't speak about the Shuffle Alliance and everything related to that, so she takes the convenient excuse.
"Still adjusting to the campus culture, you know? It's not... what you'd expect of your typical university."
Yuliana was mostly an Authoritarian leftist, but Leina has a feeling there are some aspects of the school of Hard Knocks Capitalism she'd like.
Like the dueling.
"Are you managing the jet lag well? Contrary to what some celebrities might thoughtlessly put out on to-witter, it's definitely not a 'choice' unless you have a private shuttle with King Sized Bed to sleep in."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yuliana doesn't generally think of her strength as a threat, until she's actively making one.
(And the snakes just like the vibrations.)
She's heard her own things about the Shuffle Alliance, of course -- Parminder always has his ears to the ground, and the events did leak out in unfortunate ways -- but she doesn't bring them up, here. Instead, she laughs, slinging an arm across a knee. "Hahaha... I suppose so. They did say something about how if I lift my usual three hundred or so, they wouldn't be able to get the barbell off me even if they have two people lifting. Fair enough, I suppose... it's not like these people ever had anything injected into their bones." And she did?!
(She did. That's how she can cope with lifting that much.)
"But I'm glad to hear you've a break from it all," she smiles. "I have heard that the adjustment can be difficult." Yuliana, after all, never went to university; she got an apprenticeship with a mechanic, instead. "Particularly if you were expecting something different..." Give her some credit, she's making an attempt to relate to the strange experience with some measure of sympathy. Kind of. A little.
"Anyway, I'm fine with jet lag, I'm fine!" Yuliana laughs, again, as she picks herself up off of the mat. "Back in the military, we'd just take some speed and not even worry! That's not really how I get things done any more, but it's not like I'm not used to it. I got some sleep, so my mind's straightened itself out." She ambles over to the benches, where she's already put a bottle of water; she sits herself down, gesturing Leina over, and unscrews the cap. Glug, glug, glug...
<Pose Tracker> Leina Ashta has posed.
It's a disturbing thing to say about bone injections, but Leina tries to take it in stride with a sense of humor. "I sure couldn't. They stopped with the injections in my spine... so I'm afraid I can only manage sixty, maybe seventy kilos on a good day."
The spinal headaches after were the worst. Especially when they decided to hold off on the blood patches.
There's a smile as Yuliana tries to sympathize with it, "Ah yeah. In some ways it's nice to be back in space, just- you know." There's a light pause and then-
"Well you'd like the Haros at least. And the duels in the piloting program are quite a spectacle, whenever someone out there is trying to resolve a dispute."
She got her third challenge this week. She's not even sure who this person is and why they're calling her out.
She declined it too.
"Guess it was a silly question, I just workout to manage the jet lag myself, so-!"
As Yuliana takes the water up, Leina asks, "I was thinking of joining in, but first wanted to ask how things are holding up on the home front?"
Just an easy general question... not too probing, simple small talk. She already heard some things from Dr. Kimura, so she expects talk about the kids, maybe some on Elisa.
Simple.
Easy.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"The spinal stuff was the worst," Yuliana agrees, with a pained grimace, and doesn't have to stretch to empathise with that. She distinctly remembers how much it was the worst.
At least Elisa makes sure she has plenty of painkillers if she needs to do anything of the sort.
"I do like a good Haro," she agrees, finding that thought pleasant enough. "And... duels, is it? Well, I hope you're giving them all a good lesson in what a real battle is like. You've come a long way since that night when you couldn't even close your own hatch!"
Yuliana was also trying to kidnap her ex, back then, but this is not about that. Just accept that she's proud of Leina's progress.
"Working out does help," she agrees, smiling. "And of course you're welcome... I just thought it would be impolite to continue while you were checking in." She's being considerate! She deserves a medal. "Things are quite well back home -- were you worried because I was out longer this time? We weren't having doubts or anything," 'we,' "my Elisa just missed me, so I wanted to spend a little more time with her."
She leans back, gesturing with her water bottle. "Besides," she adds, "Makar had his fifth birthday on the nineteenth -- I couldn't have missed that. He's of the age to appreciate utility vehicles... firetrucks, all-terrain vehicles -- sufferwagons, and the like, you know?" Yuliana forgot the word for 'ambulance', grabbed it in the closest language she could think of, and transliterated back while barely missing a beat. That's normal. She's normal. "So I made up a petit mobile suit for him to play with -- it's fixed to the ground, but the lights and sounds are all quite entertaining, I gather. Here, see?" She pulls out her phone, holding it up with a tentacle to show Leina an image of a five-year-old playing on what amounts to a deeply over-engineered spring rider, with little levers which control its arms and buttons to play lights and sounds as if it's firing its glue gun to fix a colony's walls. There's an entire playground in the background, and it all looks to be indoors.
(For all her disregard of safety regulations in her own work, this thing at least looks pretty safe. She did make it for a child.)
Yuliana sighs, pulling her phone back. "My Elisa is having trouble connecting with their development lately, though..." She says, and it saddens her. "I did try to teach her some of those things, you know, the grounding methods, but I don't know how well she'll apply them when I'm not there. I think this whole process... it must be very hard on her."
As opposed to it being hard for Yuliana to try and actually get better.
<Pose Tracker> Leina Ashta has posed.
"They're even more advanced there. I think some company, Burion- something or another, got the contract for more advanced functions? So we have them around as tour guides - self-riding bikes for on campus - surveillance drones."
There's a distinct pause as Leina considers it and-
"I even heard a rumor that the Counselor's office is just... a room with a Haro you talk to? Don't know if that one is true."
But as Yuliana talks about giving them a good lesson in what real battle is like, Leina actually laughs lightly.
"Oh! No. I've turned down the offers I've gotten. They're all from high schoolers. I'm flying professionally? I'm not even in the piloting program, it'd be a waste of time."
Leina rests a hand against her cheek, smiling at her as if she finds some humor in the situation, "One of them was from this sixteen year old that was offended I turned him down when he asked me out? Sixteen! I told him I was twenty one and he told me that shouldn't make a difference! ... Next day he's all challenging me to a duel to be his girlfriend. Like - what?"
There's actually a giggle in the moment, "The sheer arrogance-! No like if I took him on imagine what people would think? It'd be bullying Yuli. Plus even if I won it'd teach him the wrong lesson! It just means I was strong enough that he couldn't get what he wants from me."
She does smile, however, "Alright then, I'll get changed and join you in a second." Before the small talk moves on to the home, "A bit yeah-! Oh I wasn't worried about you having doubts or anything."
It's perhaps a white lie, but at the same time, logically, once someone decides that this thing is harmful to them and wants to remedy that - then... shouldn't one give them the benefit of the doubt.
"I mean, after everything that happened you've been very committed."
However, she does smile politely as she speaks of Elisa missing her, and- "Oh! I hope he had a good time." She says of Makar before she stops short, "Suffer-? Oh right! German." Leina giggles at that. Her German isn't the best so it took her a moment.
"It is a fun word."
Leina does blink, when she mentions a Petit Mobile Suit bolted to the ground. "Oh that's cute." She smiles looking at the image she shows her, "Judau used to do odd jobs in those things all the time, salvage work. One time he outright - he was in my bad books for the day as he tried to steal the Zeta Gundam again and just 'picked me up' and put me in the cockpit with him."
She doesn't seem to find it messed up, a five year old playing in a petit mobile suit. They're for work after all. It's no different from a fire engine in her eyes.
Leina does look at Yuliana curiously, "Ah that makes sense. She doesn't seem like... someone who has a lot of experience dealing with children."
She does decide to be polite, circumspect, but she does ask, "Your parents are mostly looking after him while you're away?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Oh, delightful!" Yuliana says, seamlessly transferring her bottle of water to a tentacle so she can clap her hands together. But -- "Eeeh?" Yuliana tilts her head, when Leina says she's turned down all her duels. Her sceptical noise is at least mostly allayed by Leina's explanation. "... oh, teenagers do tend to say foolish things like that," she sighs, shaking her head. "Heh... but I do wonder how they'll learn if they're just fish in a barrel like that. Or is it really just a playground for rich Spacenoids...?" Yuliana hasn't caught onto the SpacianSpacenoid distinction, yet. At least she's clarified that she's talking about the rich ones.
Yuliana does smile, though, when Leina compliments her commitment. It's less polite then the one Leina comes up with for Elisa; she's genuinely pleased to hear Leina recognising her efforts.
A light pause, and -- "Oh," Yuliana realises, tapping her palm to her forehead. "It didn't come out right! Excuse me, I forgot the word in Japanese, so I had to find it somewhere else. The, ahh, hospital transport... ambulance! Yes, that's it." It's not her first or even her third language, so Yuliana was bound to lose a word somewhere eventually, even as talented as she is.
"Haha, did he?" Yuliana asks, hearing about Judau's crimes. "I do hope you boxed him right about the ears. It seems like the only way he'd learn!" She doesn't particularly see the harm in furnishing Makar with a petit mobile suit to play with, either; it's an easier thing for her to put together than a firetruck, and they're both repair and rescue vehicles. Of course, she does kind of wish he wouldn't be so enamoured with a colony repair vehicle, but she's not about to tell her five year old nephew that he's too fond of space.
He'll figure it out eventually.
"My Elisa is good with them, you know," Yuliana insists, about Elisa. "She's quite gentle, and she treats them seriously... she was able to reassure Maksim all on her own one night, you know, when I had to go see to Makar. But... you're quite right. Mama handles most of their matters, day to day. We spoke about it." She sighs, looking up to the ceiling lights. "I've always wanted children, but I've never had that much occasion to work with them... I worried I wouldn't be able to treat them properly, with all the troubles they've been through. Maksim is old enough to remember a little of Bloody Valentine, you know," she adds, frowning. "Even leaving aside how Lyubov's heart failed. And my Elisa's never had children, either... so in a lot of ways, it's more like we're helping our mother see to them. I'm sure I'll grow into the role, but... mama has all that experience already."
So she is, at least, preoccupied with their wellbeing.
<Pose Tracker> Leina Ashta has posed.
"Hm. Most of them. Some of the Benerits heirs have talent, and real skill since they consider mobile suit piloting a... proper pursuit for young men of the upper class. You can tell they've been doing it since they were... young."
Leina wonders idly how young, "It's just they have no real combat experience. And they're always in the most state of the art suits their parents can provide them."
In a way Leina doesn't consider it such a bad thing for people to lean on their mobile suit's performance when they're brand new. It's just - if you don't grow out of that, you'll never grow.
"How often is a battlefield controlled like that, with weapons at low power? And you're just fighting one opponent - or in an even team battle?"
There is a sigh, and Leina hasn't decides not to correct the SpacianSpacenoid thing as a 'ringer' divide. It's not worth going into the nuances of it.
"It's fine!" Leina waves it off as Yuliana asks to be excused for forgetting the word, "Those multilingual quirks are always charming to me - you know? Some people get offended but, they're just wrong."
Leina just laughs lightly, "No I just made it clear that he wasn't getting out of this one that easily!"
A pause...
"Even if I did actually enjoy it. Just you know... that's the way Judau is? He's just so effortlessly... himself, and I love him for it." Again she smiles so easily on this subject, "But as much as I love him he was such a pain in the ass- and I can't let him forget that!"
What five year old doesn't love Space Yuliana? Huh? Maybe that's a little TELLING about the artificiality of the divides.
Yuliana insists that Elisa is good with them, and Leina has her Skeptacles on in this moment, but she does at least listen to her. But as the subject goes on...
Leina gives her a look of sympathy there, "I think every parent has that struggle, when they're taking on a child they didn't give birth to themselves." She tells her gently, "Mom definitely did. She didn't know what to do with me at first... I was actually uh-"
Leina smiles as if chagrined, "-kinda cleaning house and cooking, after school each day, once I was out of physical therapy? I just- I'd spent so long keeping house that I didn't know how to be a child anymore."
She puts a hand on Yuliana's hand and gives it a supportive squeeze, "I think the most important thing is just - everyone has their own anecdotes about how they raised their child or the like - but it's best not to take them as authorities on the matter. It's about... setting aside yourself, your own preconceptions, to understand the child and what they need."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"So they'll die the minute they walk out of their little terranium... huh." Yuliana sighs, drumming her fingers on her knee. "It's not like I can really approve of a school which teaches children that young having a fighting program... but at least children like that will largely only have the issue of becoming real pricks about conflict, thinking they know the truth of it from their pantomime. Though I suppose that's the point, isn't it? If they think they know what it's like, there's no need to think any harder."
She is at least pleased that Leina appreciates the multilingual perspective.
Yuliana laughs, shaking her head. "Judyan is quite himself, isn't he?" She asks, and the linguistic quirk there -- that she's given him such a thuggish nickname -- may well go over Leina's head, even if the fact that she's given him one might not.
(It's fine, the Ashtas are some of the good ones.)
"Ah..." She starts, when Leina shares how Sayla struggled with her, and looks up to her when she squeezes her hand. Her expression gentles, and she smiles. "I have been, you know," she says, quietly, and miraculously has the tact not to bring up her racism as an example to the Spacenoid in front of her, one who is a credit to her people or otherwise. "I was actually surprised to see how much Makar enjoyed rough-housing -- he actually likes nothing more than being tossed up in the air, can you imagine?" Leina probably can imagine, given how that's how children develop their senses of balance. At least if Yuliana can bench that much weight, she's unlikely to ever drop him. "And Maksim is quite enamoured with the monkey-bars we installed; I'm afraid they're too young to be able to safely make use of my Elisa's, but he kept wanting to play with them, so we got them their own set."
Yuliana sighs, glancing away, a frown crossing her face. "Actually, that's when I noticed my Elisa was preoccupied... I had to remind her she'd be excited he was interested. She's been so..." She hums, and presses her lips together, swallowing. "She's very happy about my progress, of course," she insists, reaching over to play with her wedding bands, "she's even feeling more secure about sharing some of her burden with me, since I'm doing better. I just worry about her... you know?"
<Pose Tracker> Leina Ashta has posed.
"Some."
Is Leina's answer, after a moment. "A few might have talent enough to live long enough to square reality with the stage fighting. A couple of them might- understand this enough already."
Leina looks away for a time as she mulls it over, "It's not like Britannia, where this service is expected. They're not being raised to be warriors - but war profiteers."
Noblesse Oblige, a rotting corpse from ancient times that was already dust in the grave by the middle ages.
The topic of Judau pulls her back, smiles as she looks upon her, the nickname DEFINITELY going over her head, since Russian is such a different language to learn.
Asticassia doesn't even offer a wide breadth of language classes any longer for her to try.
"Always... the nerve of him."
There's such fondness even in the frustration, but Leina laughs at she speaks of rough-housing, "Boys often do at that age. Girls too." Leina confides, with a chuckle, "It's not like there aren't differences but the lines - blur you know? Before the world has finished thoroughly messing us up."
Leina winks at Yuliana, "Back home - Elle used to tell me how she would beat up all the boys, as a matter of course."
And with no parents caring enough to say that's not how a young lady ought to act, Elle grew up in her own way.
Yuliana however, goes from speaking into the kids, about Elisa, and... Leina hums lightly and...
"Well, I think it's valid to worry about her, but I think - it's not healthy for two people to tie themselves... up into each other, as their only support."
She tries not to sound too negative about it, just speaking on the issue, "That leads to- so much dependence you know? For both parties. I think that it might be good if Elisa went out and spent time making normal friends who she could... talk to herself, and use for support, while you're away."
It's... a gamble, certainly, given Elisa's powers, but she doesn't think this is bad advice. How one twists it is independent from the advice itself. "That feels like it'd be healthier for her too, right?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Maybe," Yuliana says, with the kind of tone which suggests that she really isn't convinced at all. "Haa... if the children want to play at war, better to do so in a sandbox, I suppose."
It bothers her, but she's not about to march into Leina's school and chew the administration out.
(She would get VERY arrested, and that would give Elisa such a headache.)
If Yuliana thought about how Leina doesn't know Zaftran's languages for a moment, she might stop to explain, and so Judau's nickname remains a mystery.
"The boys do like those things boys like," Yuliana shares, reflecting on the lack of differences. "It was their mother, I suppose -- she had two mothers herself, my aunts are lesbians as well, you know? And she was a single mother, to boot. Believe it or not, that put quite a lot more pressure on her to make sure the family was normative. But if they ever wanted dolls or the like, I hardly see the harm in it... it isn't like we live in Zaftra, any more."
(Leina will have heard, by now, that the children she calls her nephews are more accurately her cousins -- but since she was around the same age as Lyubov, it was just easier for Maksim and Makar to understand her as their aunt, and the description stuck.)
Speaking of complex family situations --
Yuliana does frown, when Leina says it isn't healthy. "You just don't understand how close we are," Yuliana grumbles, her tentacles coiling about her midsection as one hand grasps the other, a finger resting on her wedding ring. "Just like that Lavnadim... mm, though I guess I didn't say that... so directly." Her brow knits; even having talked to her wife about it, something about it still bothers her, and her hand lifts to rest at the scarf about her neck for a moment.
"..."
Her lips part, and close, a moment later. "But I have been... trying to show her she can go out," Yuliana says, instead. "She just isn't interested when I'm not there... I asked Kaworu if he'd speak with her, anyway." And isn't that just another expression of dependence -- that Yuliana is the one trying to drag Elisa to the watering hole of the Earth beyond Yuliana and just praying she'll drink?
<Pose Tracker> Leina Ashta has posed.
It bothers Leina too but- well, she doesn't exactly have many other options. All she can do is do her part to keep the good will of Mineva's message alive.
Eight more Cyber Newtype Labs closed this summer alone. That's a net good, isn't it?
"No that makes perfect sense, you'd have to be careful in Zaftra to not... look like you're stepping too far out of line."
Leina doesn't speak more on the gendered upbringing, after all, Yuliana addressed the point, "I guess I do wonder how to, socialize them around other children. Is there a village in Greenland you'd, take them to? Or schooling..."
Perhaps isolation, is the worry of the day, in so much as this. Indeed there are many such concerns given Yuliana and Elisa's beliefs.
But then the subject trails to Elisa, and Leina tenses up just subtly, as if worried about, an eruption, but thankfully she grumbles, "It's... actually, yes. Lavnadim and Eight are going through their own struggles there. Eight has... intense separation anxiety."
Leina confides in a mild tone, as if to demonstrate the point, "I'm not saying being so close to someone is such a bad thing - I'm saying it can be isolating, depending on someone so much."
Yuliana does say that she's trying to convince her to get out and- "Well, you've been telling me that she's trying to be a greater part of the world again. Showing no interest when you're not there... that's not good for her, right?"
Leina says with a smile, "She has to find happiness, to take pleasure in other things, or else you're always going to feel bad when you're away. There must be someone out there that she can find interesting enough to seek support from, right?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Yuliana would think so.
"They're still attending their same remote school," she says. "My grandfather's country, Chukotka -- it is a very large place, but it is not a large place, you understand. Many people still live traditionally in the Okrug... even the capital Anadyr might only have fifteen thousand people living there, out of perhaps fifty thousand throughout the region. It was in pre-history that the gold mines closed, and the rest of what they called Russia, then, relocated many of those towns. There were more people living around us when I was young, but... anyway, mama did what any farmsteader does, and connected the children to a school through the internet." Yuliana pauses, and adds: "They meet up, every so often, for socialisation and activities," because she realises a shade later that Leina might not know how remote schooling works.
City people.
Yuliana frowns, though, when Leina says it's isolating. "Mm..." She's worried about it, clearly.
(She does not look at all shocked that Eight's going through that.)
"I just don't know if... my Elisa thinks like that," Yuliana sighs, finally. "I'm really the most important thing to her. Perhaps... all that's important to her." Her fingers press into her throat, again, absently. "... I... told her the story of how I couldn't tell that man, you know, he said he could be friends with someone his wife didn't like, and somehow I found it impossibly to say the obvious thing... I couldn't just say that wasn't how it worked. But when I told her, my Elisa made it clear that I was already friends with people she didn't like... but she was willing to endure it, since the people here are helping me. I felt very guilty about that... she wasn't angry, you know, but it was still shameful. I must be terribly selfish, gallivanting off... like this..."
She trails off, miserably.
<Pose Tracker> Leina Ashta has posed.
That perhaps worries Leina that the REA might decide to... take drastic measures, and utilize the children's remote learning as their vessel of doing so.
"I'm just glad they had the internet connection to do so."
Leina has been to many rural areas where one didn't have the ability to do even that much, for the lack of it.
After all, the people in power consider connectivity to the internet a luxury rather than a necessity for the people in poverty.
"I'm more used to areas where- they don't have the option, and it's a several kilometer walk to the schoolhouse." She runs a hand through her hair, "If they allow children to attend school at all."
Child labor laws are on the books everywhere, how they are enforced - if they are enforced is another story.
Leina leans back against a leg bench as she listens to Yuliana talk about Elisa, and her interest- and how she is the most important thing.
"I think... the problem is you listen to how other people speak of how their relationships are different, and you're just seeing your differences." Leina tells her quietly, "'You're the most important thing to her'. There are few couples in love that wouldn't say the same, right?"
Leina turns her head subtly to keep eye contact, "I think it's best to focus on what's in common between you, and not make it this - competition. That Elisa loves you more, or cares for you more, or makes you a greater priority than - someone else does."
Against the weight bench she leans back and, "Banagher never hesitated to say I was the most important person in his life. But- we had our struggles. We argued about you, even. He tried to push for me to stop talking to you. To say I'd 'done enough'. ... I disagreed."
Her eyes dip lower for a moment, "'Endure' it. That's such a strange word for it. It doesn't sound like it should be the right one, like you're wearing her down?"
Leina gives this small shake of her head in that moment, "Should I have, given in because I felt bad for Banagher there? That I was wearing him down by trying to help you?"
She says it so easily, but then, "... Well, I'm still here, aren't I? And I don't feel ashamed for it."
It is perhaps not the best analogy, after all - in a sense, Banagher did try to always put her first, he just... some things are so fundamental, that one should know better than to ask of them from someone.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"There's a postal address and phone network if it fails," Yuliana says, vaguely, and Leina may realise in this moment that Yuliana KNOWS what it's like to not always have that connectivity. "Where I lived, walking to school would be the luxury, Leyasha."
Zaftra gets very, very cold, and it's very, very large. Several kilometres...
... might not get you anywhere worth going.
(When she was young, they called child labour an apprenticeship, and it was perfectly legal, more or less. Sure, technically she was a year or two too young for it to be totally legal, but who was going to check all the way out there? She could just say she was sixteen.)
"It's different," Yuliana insists, but more quietly, this time. "Elisa agreed it was..."
Elisa always has put Yuliana first.
She frowns, though, arms crossing over her chest when Leina talks about Banagher. She feels a sharp sense of betrayal, of course, but -- it's at least softened by Leina's loyalty. "No, I -- I mean, it's..." And of course she wants to say that of course she's wearing Elisa down, but she can't very well agree with Leina wearing Banagher down, and --
"I didn't know... he thought that about me," she says, instead, quietly. "... I thought he was my friend... or at least... mm." She's hurt that the boy who once tried so ferociously to save her while she was coming apart would turn around and try to drive her away from Leina, never mind what she did. She glances, sidelong, to the girl beside her. "But... whatever happened between you, Leyasha? I did notice you stopped associating with him at some point after that boorish move of his, but... well, I know these things can be more sensitive when you're young," she frowns, as she brushes off her incuriosity.
<Pose Tracker> Leina Ashta has posed.
"Yeah."
Leina looks up and away, like she's vaguely looking at the sky. She knows that compared to some places on Earth, she had it good.
But that doesn't mean her situation was acceptable.
Judau was doing 'freelance' work the moment he hit fourteen, Leina imagines he had to fake his age for that, but he never admitted to it.
Leina still leans against her perch as Yuliana insists it's different, "Everyone's situation is different." Leina notes, "That doesn't mean there isn't common ground."
She truly does believe that if everyone focused on common ground of what links them rather than what divides them, the world - humanity would be a better place.
Differences can always be made up for, if people just try to be understanding.
"He was trying to be. You just... crossed his line, in Sri Lanka. Everyone has a different one."
Leina says quietly, it's perhaps not kind to tell her this rather than Banagher, but she has a feeling Banagher isn't going to even attempt to contact her about the change of relationship.
"That was just... his."
Why isn't it hers? Well, it doesn't take much soul searching to know why. It was... a line, just not one that someone can't come back from.
Yuliana asks the question though, and Leina actually sighs, and crosses her arms. It's not precisely a defensive posture either but... perhaps it is a protective one.
"It's..." Her eyes shift sideways as if looking away on the floor, and suddenly things become more difficult to articulate as she closes her eyes.
"... Usually with these things it's like you are being worn down, until the love you felt is gone and replaced with... resentment. But no, that's... that's still there..."
She squirms uncomfortably, in her seat, the skirt shifting, as she sighs, "It's- you know how it is, you hear of women who sacrifice so much in support of their man. But in my case it wasn't a career, or-"
She stops, and shakes her head again, she doesn't need to say it was the Vist Foundation, Puru-1, it's simply what happened. It happened because she loved Banagher Links.
"... and in the aftermath, he told me he wanted to walk in his father's footsteps and- take over the Vist Foundation... to claim his Majority stake in Anaheim."
There's a vulnerability there, "And I said yes. God help me. I supported him, I said he should do it, if that's what he really wants."
Her words are just growing softer, more forlorn, sad, "But was that really what I should have said? It felt like- I loved him, so I'd support him."
Her hands trail up over her face, on both sides, "And the more I thought about it, the more it drove me - drove me up a wall. After all that he wanted THAT? Why!? Why would he want- after what they did to me!"
Then whisper thin, almost too quietly to be heard, "Why did I say yes?" She needs a few seconds, it's like, she's choking a sob, burying it so it never even becomes audible, the effort becoming a real, visceral thing.
"I don't know why! I just wanted to support someone I loved! But - he never should have asked! It's not something he should want! It's not something he should - think I would EVER support!"
This time, her arms drop and curl down lower, over her abdomen, as her feet raise off the floor subtly, onto an empty weight notch, holding put there.
She takes a breath, then another, and after a long while...
"I broke up with him." She says gently, after a while, "He panicked. Told me he'd... sell it, call it all off. I- told him it wouldn't fix this. That I- made up my mind."
There's an appalling silence after that from her, at least to Yuliana, the room itself churns with her sorrow, her turmoil, and Yuliana feels none of it- there is only that which she can perceive through her eyes, her ears.
"I can't be with... someone who makes me take myself for granted."
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"He never even asked me," Yuliana scowls. "Smiled at me as if nothing ever happened... Elisa's right. I trust too easily..."
She might have spoken more about Sri Lanka, if she'd kept talking about herself -- and it has come up, in therapy. She's been able to admit that she did something awful, even if she still insists she was tricked into it. (A thing which is not entirely wrong, but not really the point of the therapy, either.) She doesn't like that she was able to be that kind of person, who fired on normal people.
Except, for once in her life, she tries to be concerned about someone else! He was Leina's boyfriend, after all -- and then he became a Links-Vist.
So she listens to her, instead.
Of course it hurts to hear that she was in that situation; of course she thinks of Elisa, silently enduring Yuliana's treatment. (Would she resent her?) But she does try to stay present with what Leina is saying, while she's saying it; it's evidently not easy for her to say.
"... he was thoughtless," says the narcissist, in the end. (It's easy to say it about someone else.) "He said he loved you... he should have considered your feelings. They hurt you terribly, Leyasha. I did worry, when I heard about the name change, but... mm... I didn't know if it was my place to get in the middle of something you cared about enough to fight me over." Matters of domestic bludgeoning are a little -- confused, in Yuliana's head.
But she can see that Leina is suffering, even if all she sees around her is that horrible gaping mess of nothing, all torn from itself, Herself gazing in.
"I... I don't know if you want a hug from someone like me," she says, sounding a little hapless, but not scooching closer on the bench anyway. She pulls out a packet of pocket tissues from her vest pocket, instead, opens them up, and offers them out via one of those tentacles. It has a longer reach than her aura, after all.
And perhaps she's not as guarded about the sorts of things Elisa wouldn't like her to say, as she sympathises instead with, "... I'm sorry it happened that way. I know you cared for him."
<Pose Tracker> Leina Ashta has posed.
Leina doesn't try to explain for Banagher in that regard, she's not really trying to defend him. He can say what he wants - if the two ever speak again.
"He does love me." Leina whispers, not really defending him just - correcting the record, "And I love him - and that's... the whole problem."
Would she? If not for this Bond. Two people drawn together, she wasn't even trying to be found. They shook hands and...
... that's how it started.
"It's like when you think, you love someone so much that nothing could ever really come between you."
There's a deep breath and, "But some things... should." She says gently, before nodding quickly in saying how it hurt her terribly. In the end, perhaps it's a semantic difference.
But this is uncharted territory for her, and she's not sure how to feel, as one arm, rubs the other as she holds herself in this moment. However Yuliana comes closer. And there is an offer of a hug.
Yuliana has the courtesy to reach outside of her aura, with tissues, and Leina gropes for one, but then - a moment later, scootches closer, and putting her arms around her in a quick hug, burying her face against her in a quick sob.
"God- I duh-I do... care for him... I do-! I juh-just... I..."
She can't even say it after a moment. She just knows that caring for someone like this is bad for her.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
Of course it's confronting to see Leina's grief, coupled with the fact that she does love him. If it were her, she might well say -- nothing should come between people who love each other that much.
But Leina's relationship is different, isn't it?
It's clearly not fair on her.
"Of course," she says, instead of all that. "I didn't... of course you love him." What can she do except affirm Leina's feelings, here? She can't very well tell her she's wrong about that wretched boy.
(It is absolutely that easy for Yuliana to turn on someone like that in her head.)
She's surprised when it's Leina who closes the space, but not so surprised that she can't embrace her, squeezing her -- with gentle pressure, though she surely could break her bones if she applied herself -- and rocking her, gently, to and fro. "It's all right," she says, soothingly, in the black. "It's all right... he's the one who gave up on you, doing such a fool thing. It's not fair that you're left to tidy up... it's not fair, Leyasha. Come, you're a wonderful young woman... there are people in this world who will not do these things to you."
And then there's her.
And Yuliana is just going to keep soothing Leina until she cries herself out or needs to step back. It's only after she's collected herself a little that she'll pose her revolutionary suggestion to help Leina feel better:
Working out to help deal with having too many feelings.
According to the people here, that's a coping skill, too.