2023-01-30: Please tell me where I came from is not where I now go
- Log: Please tell me where I came from is not where I now go
- Cast: Yuliana Kafim, Michele Luio
- Where: California Justice Facility, Britannia
- Date: 2023-01-30
- Summary: Yuliana tells Michele all she wants to know about the Institute, and her relationship with Rita. Unfortunately, all Michele's assurances that she'll work to free Yuliana turn to ashes... when the REA appears to take her home.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
It's been ten days. Only ten days -- and already, in G-Hound's prison, Yuliana's spirit is wavering. The wardens call her nothing but a prisoner; it's only when she's interrogated that she's considered as a person, with a loved one, and a life, and motivations. It wears on her. So too does the panopticon, with no corner to hide in, no safety from the sniper trained on her position. (She does not know there are more than one.) Even the warmth of the place bothers her -- it's not unbearably warm, but the uniform cosiness of this cell is just another stark and striking difference to the chill of her Northern home. (The halls are colder, in the Castle; the rooms warmer, with those fireplaces crackling. It's not a matter of climate. They don't have air conditioning, though certainly vents have been crafted to carry the warm air of a fire about. It feels so different, to this.)
Treize... was kind enough to arrange more reading material, in her cell. She requested this text discussing the application of camshafts to modern wanzers, as if she could still think about the one she's prototyping, in the midst of all this. In that font, the words swim on the page, and Yuliana tells herself it's because she's upset. She tells herself this even as her eyes well up with frustrated tears afterwards, and she makes a miserable little noise, clutching the book to her chest so she doesn't toss it at the clear wall. It's not glass. It won't break so easily. Even so...
"Elya," Yuliana murmurs, miserable, though she's being watched even now. Let them watch! Let them see what they have done! Oh, she misses her wife, that woman of greatest beauty and glory and irresistibility and indomitability. She misses her, and she worries for her, because Elisa swore to save her. Over and over she promised, and Elisa is not one who breaks her promises. She promised, but she still hasn't come to save her...
If only she were here, Yuliana thinks. No --
If only I were there, Yuliana thinks.
She never should have left her. She should have listened to her...
Yuliana reaches up a hand, to rub at her eyes. They're damp. They're often damp, now. As much as she plays at the upper hand, she doesn't have it, now. She is vulnerable and alone, reliant on the mercy of her enemies -- and not all of them, she thinks, recalling Dionysus's eyes, are as motivated by mercy as they claim. Yuliana is so mortal, and in these moments it grows harder and harder to veil her fear, as she looks up to sight the barrel of the gun that's always trained on her.
"Mm..." Yuliana hums, discontent.
The voice of the warden cuts in through the cell -- transmitted through speakers, though he's just standing outside. "The prisoner will proceed to her restraints," he insists, again.
"I..." have a name, Yuliana meant to bite out, only for the resistance to die on her lips. She looks away, and puts the book down, on that slab of a bed she's sleeping on. (It's padded, but there's no real mattress, to it.) "I'm going," she says, instead, compliant.
The audience chair has bindings at its arm and legrests, and when Yuliana sits herself in the chair and presses her limbs to them they click, about her lower limbs. Her arms and legs thus restrained, she's no threat to a visitor. "All right, Ms. Luio," the warden says, turning to that young woman. "You're free to enter. Be aware that the prisoner is reportedly... hazardous to someone of your sensitivity. I'm assured that the seating is arranged far enough away that you won't be harmed."
And, indeed, the two chairs and a table facing Yuliana's chair are nine feet away -- outside of her melee grasping range, and therefore, outside of the horrific hollowness which surrounds her. Any Newtype of sufficient strength would immediately realise getting too close is a bad idea, by the sickening event horizon which rings this field, the alert before malady.
Yuliana can't force the issue, though, as she is. Neither will she open the conversation. She drums her fingers on the armrest, and she waits.
<Pose Tracker> Michele Luio has posed.
A criminal in a cell. It's depressing, but not out of some form of pity. Perhaps an understanding - of what cells like this do to people, of what it feels like to be in one.
Michele Luio is stone-faced as she nods to the warden. She has nothing to worry about with the anti-Newtype aura - a professional sham, a liar who's fooled everyone, who practically bought her way into this cell, but...
She accepts the seat, because the charade needs to continue for now.
"Miss Kafim. My name is Michele Luio." Based out of Hong Kong, trading magnate, autonomously OCU. What could she want with Yuliana?
"I'm here to discuss a mutual friend." She steeples her fingers together, having already decided her approach. They're in a federal building, so she can't use certain names and words. Yet, she's not going to do much negotiating with a prisoner until it benefits her. She's on the frontfoot, but Yuliana can always refuse to speak...
"Do you remember Ritechka?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Yes, the scion of Luio & Co," Yuliana confirms, and she can at least still play at stoniness, pretend to be a fortress. "I'm familiar."
The REA does remember Hong Kong, in all their autonomy.
She grunts, lips pressing to a thin line, when Michele brings up a mutual friend. Her mind leaps, immediately, to the... various jobs she's taken care of, in that corner of the OCU.
What it doesn't go to is --
Michele's first answer is in her expression -- the widening of her eyes and parting of her lips, stricken with a sharp-edged breath. Her shoulders tense; her fingers clutch at the armrests.
In the end, her verbal response is little more than a formality: "... what do you want?"
<Pose Tracker> Michele Luio has posed.
"I want everything you can remember. About her then. About her...now." Michele says, coolly, not superficially reacting to Yuliana's expression. Newtype labs aren't...good memories.
"And in return, I'll do everything in my power so you can walk."
Michele is playing the cards heavy-handed - but she doesn't have much time in this cell. "Perhaps it'll even be by the end of the night. I'm nothing if not resourceful."
"She's very dear to me. You must understand." Michele admits. Trade for trade.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"You can... get me out of here...?" Yuliana sounds sceptical, at the start of the sentence -- but recalling the sway of her company, she's less sure of her scepticism, by the end.
It's heavy-handed, but Michele's not only benefiting from her own pressure, after so much time. Even if Yuliana sees the manipulation, it's another thing entirely to abjure it.
She sinks, a little, and lowers her gaze, looking down and away. "... and you'll have it," she murmurs assent, a moment later.
Yuliana takes a breath.
"Rita came to Medical around the same time as my rehabilitation finished," she says, quietly. "'87, or thereabouts... well, she looked... rather afflicted by the whole thing, so... it wasn't as if she could help how affronting she was, I thought at the time... they'd assured me I was being discharged. So I told her she'd be fine so long as she was tough... that we were more valuable to the Republic out there than in Medical. That it wasn't forever... that we could live a normal life again. I -- I did believe that," she defends herself, but there's no real teeth to it.
There is guilt, though, in her eyes. "Me, I was able to leave the facility, eventually. I could -- sleep with the rest of the troops. I had work in the military... but they still had to treat me, so I still had to go back. On weekends, or on leave... you know. I talked to her about it... it's not like treatment was easy, in that place, so I guess... I don't know. Maybe I thought it would make things easier. Except -- except even when I was discharged, it -- it wasn't. Sometimes I talked to her about that, too, but... I wasn't a very pleasant person to those creatures, even back then. Though, you know, I was right! I was right... I was made to hurt her. She should have stayed away from me."
A pause.
"Not that Dr. Devi would have let her. I guess... she figured out I was sharing things with her, even though she was a Newtype, and she'd taken pains to ensure I disliked them... I suppose she didn't want us to grow particularly close, so she started testing us together. It was... not particularly pleasant. I really ended up hating her, but she never did. Stupid girl," Yuliana hisses, fingers clutching bone-knuckle tight. "No matter how cruel I became... that wretched creature...!" And it's easy to say she's just being hateful, to spit it out.
"Well, my life on the outside was continuing on, even as the years progressed," she says, and still doesn't quite meet Michele's eyes. "One day, late in '93 -- November, or December, I can't quite remember -- well, I said some awful things to her, as ever, I blamed her, I'll tell you that. But the next time I reported for testing, she was gone. Dr. Devi was so angry at me for what I'd done... because of my indiscretion in Helmajistan, they had to appease the Federation. They were baying for my head... they'd caught me in the act. So they had to give Rita up to bury the allegations..." Her breath hitches, despite herself. "I-- I didn't mean for that to..."
She quiets, again. Her eyes blink closed, for a moment. "... anyway, that's the last I saw of her, until I was trapped in Denver Colony. And -- and really, I've still not seen her. I can't see her. That wretched idiot has... well, someone like me can't comprehend something like that." Yuliana shakes her head. "But Leina told me she spoke of me. She remembers me. And that Gundam she's piloting, somehow, it... keeps protecting me. Me! It's so stupid--!!" Tears well in Yuliana's eyes, and she silences herself for longer, now, as she cries to choke them down.
<Pose Tracker> Michele Luio has posed.
The info Michele gets is enough to assist. There's new information, too - Dr. Devi, Helmajistan - most can be filed away, but...
That's not what she dwells on. "You're not to blame for her predicament." It may appear to be just casual reassurance, but it's not.
Michele knows exactly who to blame for it.
"But, onto the business of this. You said she's protecting you? Either you're very important..."
...or she still has the ability to hang onto human biases. Curious...could this be the nugget of information Michele needed? She'll have to push Yuliana further, eyes closing for a second as she steels herself.
"Tell me." She ignores the tears, for now.
"What do you mean by them making you hurt her?"
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"... I am," Yuliana says, with a delay for a breath. Important, that is. "But I can't fathom why she'd value me that way."
She can't fathom Rita regarding her as a friend, after everything she did.
She blinks her eyes, to clear them; it's better than nothing. Her hands twitch, as if she'd like to reach up and scrub her face, but of course she's too tightly secured for that.
"Precisely what I said," she insists, still a shade miserable. "The testing was frequently such that I could sacrifice Rita's wellbeing for my own, in one way or another. I... remember the first time it... stuck," and for all there's venom in her voice, the way it halts betrays something more than anger, to her. "They'd been putting us through those experiments together for months... well, this time, it was about intuition. I saw her dodging the rubber bullets... but I wasn't capable. They didn't tell me it was because I was a failure of a Cyber-Newtype... they said I was something else. But when they put us together, she was as helpless as me," Yuliana's teeth grit, and perhaps she still gets a little satisfaction, from that.
Even if it's satisfaction they designed for her.
"So when I realised I could see the muzzle flashes outside the spotlight... I just grabbed her and made her deal with it. Let her cope with the bruising... at least she'd serve some purpose, is what I thought, I suppose. Anyway... after that, that's the sort of thing which happened... if I had some opportunity to let her suffer instead, I was sure to take it. But... no matter how bad it got, she never responded in kind. Stupid... tch, though I guess I'm the stupid one, falling for some ex-Titan's mindgames." With new venom, she insists: "Whatever."
Yuliana falls silent, for a moment, brow arcing up as she looks down at the wedding bands on her right finger. It's some comfort, perhaps, more than the scars up and down her bared arms, the evidence of those experiments.
"Of course," she sighs, after a moment of that silence, "all that effort was in service of the broader goal, I suppose. Since I'm a predator of Newtypes... they couldn't make Cyber-Newtypes from us, but I survived, and now I'm answer to that violation. An 'Anti-Newtype' agent... but the REA created a living weapon, as you can see, not a system on a Gundam. I'm a top-secret project of the state, of course, but I'm not inclined to keep quiet after their... after what they did, to me." Her eyes narrow, and her teeth clench, again. "After how they look at me."
<Pose Tracker> Michele Luio has posed.
Michele's sympathy for Yuliana is dwindling, but it's still there. Is this what Michele could have become, in another life?
"Of course she didn't respond. And you did it anyways. But you didn't put her in that cell, you just made her suffer in it. But...I keep my bargains." And yet...
"Is this lab still functional?" Michele seizes on the 'not inclined to keep quiet' line. She needs to go there...
Whether she's storming it or not.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"... yes," Yuliana says, though she hesitates a moment as she says it. "It's not the Renascence Orchid Project any more, though... now, they call it the Institute for Continuing Study. And they called it other things, between then and now. I suppose Dr. Devi rebranded every time someone got close to figuring her out... well, it would be embarrassing for everyone if they found that a Titan was sheltering in the Republic. Especially since she's the lead scientist..."
Yuliana's eyes drop, instead, to the scars on her arm. Many are surgical -- but not all. She's a veteran, too, after all. "They have Cyber-Newtype projects, and cyborg projects... and me, though I suppose those horrible people would consider me the former." Her lips curl, in unvarnished disgust. "Cloning, perhaps, still, as well. I wouldn't know. They know better than to show it to me, now."
She looks utterly disgusted with the prospect.
"Dr. Devi was... distracted from my regular torment," she says, delicately. "She has a new pet project, now. I understand it's quite painful... something about integrating. And my intelligence officer has told me about Gundam parts, being shipped next door... but I've no more information than this." She pauses, and her eyes are haunted by more degrees, for a moment. "If I didn't know better, I'd think they were continuing the EXAM research they discontinued, when it turned out my presence forbade ghosts from their torn flesh. Since they couldn't use it to make up for my... so-called deficiencies, they abandoned the concept, but... well, a deal was arranged to work on things apart from me, so... I've no proof, in any case."
<Pose Tracker> Michele Luio has posed.
The Institute for Continuing Study. That's what she needs. But she's not done.
Michele tilts forward, but does not extend past her 'safe' radius. "EXAM research...Gundam parts...hell, Cyber-Newtypes were bad enough."
"She was a Titan?" There's a momentary sneer on Michele's face, as she mentally ticks down the time she has. Just enough to ask another question or two, maybe more.
"Ghosts in machines...integration...how old is this research? How many years back are we talking?"
It could be nothing, but if a ghost could inhabit a machine...perhaps?
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Apparently," Yuliana frowns. "She kept it hidden... I didn't realise until I found some of her personal correspondence. But since my project began during the Titans' blackout, in '85... I should have known it was more than a convenient coincidence. Dr. Devi must have known she'd have an opening to move, then."
Her fingers tighten to fists, arms jerking, just so, against their bindings. "I don't enjoy knowing I'm some Titan's project, I assure you," she adds, with venom. Perhaps it even covers her shame.
"They... stopped sometime in '92," Yuliana says, with a beat of hesitation, as she places the date. "They weren't willing to commit to the process, since I wasn't compatible with their projections. I guess after I terminated four of their subjects to no measurable success, all their enthusiasm for the possibilities spluttered out." Which is to say: they were measuring up a suit for Yuliana's use.
"As for the original research -- I don't know," Yuliana scowls, with new bitterness. "Back from the One Year War, maybe? I'm not a goddamn whitecoat. Don't ask me for these things."
<Pose Tracker> Michele Luio has posed.
'92...too early. They may have made the tech, but they weren't the ones to do it to Rita. Even so...
"Your cooperation is appreciated so far by the Luio corporation." Michele notes, with a tone that if it goes unappreciated, things may change. "One more thing. Dr. Devi - do you have a full name?"
Michele feels in control of this situation, clearly. She would even if Yuliana wasn't strapped to a chair.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Dr. Divya Devi," Yuliana complies, with a light frown. "She's a neurologist by specialty, I believe. She'd have to be, given... what they did to me." And she has told Michele so, so much, but she does not speak on the details of this.
Not without prompting, anyway.
Yuliana takes a breath, and looks to Michele, again. Her green eyes shine, just so. She couldn't evacuate all the tears. "But will you tell me one thing?" She asks, and perhaps she means it to be fierce, but it comes out vulnerable.
"I'm aware of your reputation, of course. But now you stand before me..." Yuliana's eyes narrow. "Why would you lie about being one of those wretched creatures? You are better than them, Michele. I don't -- I don't understand why you want to be seen as a Newtype, of all things."
One of the thing she told Michele was that she was an anti-Newtype weapon.
No wonder, then, she can tell.
<Pose Tracker> Michele Luio has posed.
Michele gets the name. She's about to wrap up, when Yuliana asks her own question.
And she has her. Michele eyes the cameras. She hopes, no, demands in her head they're not recording. But she always knew it was a possibility. Even so...
"Because the world isn't fair. Sometimes, our fates are chosen for us, and we must act our roles to get what we want."
Michele's eyes narrow, sharp. "That's what we do in life. Play roles. Put on masks. Soldier, psychic, hero, rogue." She closes her eyes.
"And when we remove the mask? What's left but shame and death? So, to answer your question - I plan to survive, and this is the hand fate dealt me to do so. That's all."
Her eyes reopen. She'll take a moment to see how Yuliana responds, but it's clear she plans to leave.
<Pose Tracker> Yuliana Kafim has posed.
"Ah," Yuliana breathes. "No wonder."
And Michele has validated her beliefs, at least. Certainly she sounds more certain, as she says: "You are a character in this twisted narrative, after all..."
She doesn't look like she approves of the role she's chosen, anyway.
The speaker buzzes. "Ms. Luio," the warden says, and he sounds more tense than he could be. "Your time is up. The prisoner is due for transfer, so please step outside." He's perfectly polite to her, at least, even as surprise crosses Yuliana's face. She looks through the clear walls of the cell, and sees nothing but the usual guards.
"Transfer? What is he talking about...?" She's tense, and her voice is smaller, as she looks to Michele again. "What's he talking about?" She asks, again, vulnerable, afraid.
But even though he phrases it like a request, Michele can surely identify a demand. He is patient enough to wait for her to leave.
Or, rather -- the other guards are.
They're dressed in drab, REA olives, as four of them pour into the room from an unseen passageway, as soon as the room is clear. Yuliana was never released from her bindings, and she is left to struggle, in them, as she sees them entering the room. "You-- what?!" She yelps, as they close the space.
"You're going home, Captain," one assures her, as he takes something from a sealed box. It looks a little like a choker. It isn't.
Yuliana jerks back, and her eyes are defined by their whites. "No! Colonel Khushrenada assured me I'd not be returned to the Republic!" And she identifies what that choker is, even as one soldier grasps her head to keep it still, as another locks it about her neck. "No-- no, get that thing off me! A bomb collar?! What is the meaning of this?!"
"It's just a little insurance," a female soldier assures her, as she releases her head. "Until we can give you a proper debriefing." Which is a wonderful euphemism for re-education, in the present setting. "You're confused, Captain."
"NO!" Yuliana screams, even as the medic with them produces a syringe. "Elya! Elya, save me! Please! Please, I'm sorry! Please, save--" and all at once she sags, in her restraints, as the sedative enters her veins. There's less fight in her, as she whimpers the end of her sentence: "... save me..."
"Target secured," the medic confirms, to their team leader. They release her bindings, then, unlock the chain and shackle about her ankle, and put her in a fresh set of handcuffs. They have to help her up, but with her head full of cotton-balls, she can't think of running.
Perhaps she manages to meet Michele's eyes, on the way, as the REA soldiers lead her out.
Perhaps she recognises the agony.
Her compliance, too.
<Pose Tracker> Michele Luio has posed.
For a while, Michele had grown to hate Yuliana through this discussion. Bullying Rita, being a threat to her existence even now...
But as the transfer is mentioned, Michele is CLEARLY just as clueless. She doesn't get a chance to say anything except 'I'm sorry. I had meant it.'
As she watches them put the bomb collar on Yuliana, declaring a betrayal, Michele's hand rises to her mouth. She needs to do something, she wants to-
She can't. She's helpless. Helpless. Helpless. What can she do? For a woman she doesn't know? What can she do? As the sedative enters Yuliana, as she cries out, Michele holds the urge to vomit, old scars opening up. As she passes by...
Michele just turns, and does what she's always done. She runs away. Brick's waiting to pick her up, and there's nothing she can do.
Or, more accurately, nothing she will try to do.