2018-05-23: To Feel Such Regret
- Log: To Feel Such Regret
- Cast: Avril Vent Fleur, Noeline
- Where: Vane
- Date: May 23rd 2018
- Summary: After the attack on the library, Avril goes to Noeline to ask about the feelings that have been plaguing her mind since she awoke on Lunar. Noeline helps put things in perspective.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
It all comes about with a knock on the door.
It's been a few days since the event that had left Vane's library with a hole in the wall... and more damage besides. In that time, Avril has had the space to think.
She had already known on both fronts. What Noeline -- and Riesenlied -- had been a part of. What they had done.
And, herself.
...
There has been a lot to think about.
Sin...
Punishment...
And, possibly, forgiveness?
If it could be granted.
"Noeline? Are you about? This is Avril," she calls out, one hand pressed against the door.
She meant it truly when she said as much to her friends -- she does not intend to keep secrets. And yet, there's this. ...How do you talk about this?
There's no evidence. None at all. Just a feeling, a familiar feeling.
Familiar, terrible actions.
If she told Rebecca and Dean what she fears may be so, would they forgive her, without knowing the truth of the sin, whatever it might be?
...They would.
That's why she can't talk to them about it, not yet.
Not until she's certain.
She can't keep this uneasy feeling bottled up forever, but perhaps... there are those who may understand it.
'Guilt'. That's what this is called, isn't it.
"If you have the time, there is..." She pauses, as if taking an uncertain step forward. Her voice is lowered when she voices the remainder of her sentence:
"There is something I would like to speak with you about privately."
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
Noeline is remarkably easy to find; she's sat in what appears to be 'her' corner of the tavern, a couple of comfortable chairs arranged as if it were an office, and a table with a number of maps strewn across it. In flagrant disregard for the proper preservation of written materials, one of them has been marked with a variety of pencil scribblings - notes on the lay of the land, arrows indicating likely entry points, and updates to the aged map.
The demon herself is sat casually on one of the chairs, apparently having given up with her work for a moment to instead thumb through a novel - but she looks up at the call with raised eyebrows, quick to set a bookmark carefully in place and close the dollar-novel. "... it's a free tavern," she snorts pleasantly, waving the pale-haired girl inside.
Her grin fades a little at Avril's serious and uncertain expression, however, her eyebrows jumping up just a little more before she's suddenly risen from her seat to move behind the bar. Something tells her this is going to be a more complex issue than she'd expect, and that means: "... tea?" she chuckles quietly as she indicates a chair. "Please, sit down. I would note that Riese is a better counsellor than I am," she adds with a toothy sort of grin. "But-- well, it wouldn't be you if you hadn't thought this over a little, I suspect."
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
There is perhaps a moment's awkward silence before the young woman lets herself in, closing the door behind her. One glance is turned towards the ever present bartender, as if to gauge his intentions, and then...
Avril crosses her hands in front of her, fingers briefly entwining, and then with quiet footsteps covers the distance between herself and where Noeline is seated.
If she were a stone statue, her expression could neither be more etched onto her face. Nary a twitch betrays her as she approaches where the Metal Demon is seated.
"If it is no trouble," she says, inclining her head in a nod.
There is silence.
"...Yes. However, it is not consolation nor advice that I require," she states plainly. "I simply would inquire after your perspective in this."
She sits down, with care, smoothing her skirts out as if something instead preys upon her mind.
"We... I suppose the reason I am seeking your advice..."
"...I suspect we are not much different, you and I. I..."
She shakes her head, lifting her blue-eyed gaze.
"...I understand. About Arctica... and that man's wrath. What was done, and what transpired afterwards. I understand your desire for atonement."
Her gaze slips downwards at the table before them. Her hands entwine in her lap; her eyes hood, as if in deep thought.
"...My memories have not returned, Noeline. I have no evidence, no firm suggestion that this is indeed the truth. And yet..."
She shakes her head. "I know this feeling, if not from whence it springs. I have done something terrible. I am certain of it."
Some unremembered crime.
She raises a hand, pressing it against her chest. "...That is why. I thought that you might understand..."
She again lifts her head.
"And know it is not comfort or forgiveness that I seek. Such things... cannot simply be given freely. I understand this as well."
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
It might be a little rude, but the usual customers at the Wolfsbane Tavern have started doing a lot to help out, including running the bar on regular occasion. Janey and Mikaia were quick to learn that the current owner is not exactly the finest of business minds, and they've ended up the defacto servers, giving the man his first tastes of 'days off' in a couple of years.
Which is to say that it's just the two of them right now; the place still doesn't get a lot of customers, at least not at this time of the day, so the room is quiet as Noeline takes her time in making a pot of tea, lending an ear to Avril's rather halting statements.
Perhaps it's to her credit that her first question is not 'how do you know for sure' - she takes that part as granted, instead humming to herself as she crosses back to her seat like a Crimson Noble taking up a throne. Two cups, a little bowl of sugar, and some milk set between them. It's not fancy, but Noeline seems pleased at her work regardless.
"... it is difficult to say how similar our two cases might be, or what perspective I might be able to provide," she admits with a sigh, crossing her legs as she props the saucer on one knee to balance it there. "For me, Arctica is both a place I remember fondly, and it is a place where I began to change. The two aspects are tied together - and that forms the crux of the rest of my thoughts on the place. Everything is tied around the place itself and what happened there, and how it affected me."
She pauses, and glances across the table at Avril, feeling a frown spread across her face. "... I am not very good at this sort of discussion..." she grumbles under her breath, then shakes her head. "I suppose what I am trying to clumsily ask is - what caused your own change, do you think? The difference in experiences since losing your memory? What would your thoughts be should you regain them, I wonder."
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
It's a difficult thing to explain, as much as she might tread out the logic to herself in her mind. No -- it's because she has examined the logic of it. It's but a feeling in the end -- the assurance that only a sort of 'self-knowledge' can bring about.
If one can be said to know oneself, when they have perhaps a year and a bit of memories to call their own.
What she has lost, she cannot say.
It's just a feeling. A very self-assured, certain feeling.
Beyond that day she opened her eyes and cried at the sight of a young boy, she can't 'recall' anything but feelings.
In her mind, there is a wall of ice. Small sections of it have crumbled free in recent months and lie as powder to glint in the sunlight, but they are but fragments of the whole -- the glacier cannot be easily obliterated. What lies beneath there remains.
"They are not exact duplicates," Avril agrees, reaching out a hand to brush fingers against the teacup. "...I cannot make that claim. But... In that moment, I understood you, Noeline." Her gaze is sober, intent, as she stares into the eyes of the Metal Demon across from her. "It was..." Picking up the cup, she exhales a breath, settling back in her seat. "It may be presumptive of me in the end, to make such a claim. Yet, this is still what I feel."
Emotions are powerful things. Without words, so much can be conveyed.
She studies Noeline carefully yet, gaze resting upon her as she considers her words.
"Where you began to change... A place where your regrets rest," she murmurs, her gaze hooded as in in deep contemplation.
Only to shake her head. "No. I appreciate your honest insight, Noeline. That is why I came to you. As I said, I am not seeking my own absolution. I do not believe I can atone for what I cannot recall. Nevertheless, this is not something I can lock away into my own heart."
Her gaze is reflected darkly in the surface of the tea, still steaming. "...Without even knowing the truth, they would forgive me." Her gaze flicks upwards at Noeline. "My friends. ...I cannot fault them for that. Yet, the thought of their forgiveness is..."
Her face grows drawn. Muted in distress.
"...It is too painful."
What changed? What happened? Try as she might, her own mind will not let her pass.
"What would your thoughts be should you regain them, I wonder."
Avril exhales a slow, measured breath. "That, I do not know. Nor do I know what changed me in the first place."
No, that isn't precisely true.
She's caught the trailing end of that feeling before. Crushing isolation. A sense of loss and grief, as if her heart has been clawed out of her chest.
It's so very cold here.
The teacup rattles on the saucer for an instant, before Avril's hand steadies.
"It must have... been before I lost my memories. Otherwise, I would not know to feel such regret."
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
Lifting the cup to her lips, Noeline does at least know how to be patient at times like these; she stares over the lip of it, watching the way in which the other woman's hands move and shake, the shifts as she tries to properly explain what she's feeling and how she's feeling it.
Eventually, she drops her cup back to her saucer, letting out a faintly amused breath. "Well, then... I suppose, first, that I should say 'thank you' for the understanding. ... there are too many people who refuse to believe that someone's mind might change. Too many people who are ready to assume that all Hyadeans think alike - or who don't realize that many of them don't know how to think at all. It's no exaggeration to say that I was the same way."
Chin on her hand, she looks off to one side for a long moment, her gaze far off as she mulls the situation over. "I am a much more pragmatic soul than Riesenlied is, even after softening considerably," she chuckles at last, as if rolling the words around in her head still. "From that point of view, I understand your concerns - without knowing what you did, and why, it is difficult to say what you can do to atone for it."
"Still..." the demon closes her eyes, letting out a soft little chuckle to herself. "I would like to think it is at least possible to do something constructive by seeking to change yourself - to seek to be a better person in what little ways you can along the way, watching and learning the world as you go. At the very least, it would probably prove to be habit forming," she adds with an amused sigh.
When she looks back at Avril, her gaze is a little sharper, her brow furrowing downwards as she tries to work through unfamiliar territory. "The fact that you do not know where to direct your atonement is not your fault," she states bluntly, stressing the words carefully. "And, last I recall, amnesia is not something lifted lightly. The desire to atone is laudable - but knowing your current limits is important as well."
She pauses, thinking of Riesenlied, and her expression becomes comically glum. "... if much easier said than done."
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
"It's something that I have come to understand, myself. Admittedly, I have been favorably inclined towards the both of you from the outset, but, between what I have learned and what I have seen... Change in a person's heart is possible, but for that to occur, trust must also be granted." The cup clinks against the saucer as Avril pauses to consider her words. "...There are those who do not think among all people, I'm afraid. Nation against nation, or tribe against tribe... My memory may be short, but I have read histories." Her eyes hood. "When it's against a perceived threat, it's quite easy not to think."
In spite of the topic, Avril's lips tilt into a small smile. "At times, it seems that pragmatism is merely the capacity to do what must be done." She thinks again of that blade plunging into Lady Harken's chest, thinks of all the times she's waded into the fray with the sole intent to end the threat before her as quickly as possible. Everything she's done to help protect her friends. The smile does soon fade. "But, there is no joy in it, is there?" she says, her voice quiet. "Nevertheless..."
One does as they must.
"...Indeed. Logically, it is, ah..." She pauses a moment, as if considering her linguistic options. "...'putting the cart before the horse' is the expression, is it not? Nevertheless, the strength of this feeling is..." She bows her head, lifting a hand to her chest for a moment. "Perhaps this 'regret' and 'guilt' were also handed down to me by the person that I used to be. Perhaps something had already provoked a change of heart."
She straightens. "So, then. To echo what you had just said: perhaps that is the best use of my time and the best salve for this inclination I have uncovered, to continue to learn and to endeavor to become a better person."
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
With a light chuckle, Noeline settles back in her chair, balancing the teacup and saucer expertly on her knee. Something in her eyes flashes for a moment, as if she's found a particularly interesting line of conversational attack - but she leaves it for the time being, instead letting out a theatrical sigh. "Haaah... you are not wrong, I suppose. I've walked the world enough to realize that myself - but even then, this is a rather complicated case of it. A sustained campaign of hatred on both sides - there's too much history for either side to stop fanning the flames just like that, much as I'd like to think otherwise."
Her expression stills; she too is thinking of Berserk, and her free hand flexes slightly as she remembers the feeling of dredging up techniques she'd thought she'd left behind. "... on the contrary, there is far too much joy involved - just only in the short term. It would be so easy just to let myself have a wild few moments - to ignore the regret that would come afterwards."
She pauses, and lets out an annoyed breath. "Do you know, I have had to pause and seriously dissuade myself from crippling Miss Everstead-Rey in the past? Before she became the Hellion she is now, when she spat threats at us day in day out, when she said our free thought was inconvenient--" her voice raises slightly, and she catches herself, letting out a long sigh, an unamused smile playing at her lips. "I did not, of course, but I certainly did indulge the thought that it was what Wayside needed in order to be safe from her. I am not nearly as much of a saint as Riesenlied is."
She lets the air between them still for a long moment, taking a sip from her cup - perhaps it's her version of counting to ten mentally, because she sounds much more at ease when she continues, calling back to whatever she spotted earlier. "It is as you said just now: 'Change in a person's heart is possible, but for that to occur, trust must also be granted'. That goes as much for change in your own heart, as it does for anyone else's. I regret my inaction at Arctica, and at Adlehyde - but I have to trust my decision that inaction was the only course of action available to me, as well. I have to accept the simple fact that, at that time, I was one Metal Demon against a horde. I cannot focus only on regret, and yet hope to move forwards."
She settles back. "And if a change of heart was something already provoked within you, all the better - it may be rather cold comfort to not know what exactly it is you regret, but at least the two parts of you - past, and present - are of the same purpose."
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
"Yes..." Avril can't help but sigh. "It may be possible that there is another way. However, given the collective wounds each of us has sustained at the hands of another... simply standing down may be difficult. Then there are those, too, on either side who are eager to continue the fight..."
She can't help but recall a conversation with Riesenlied, months ago, back before the other woman had made her decision with regards to her kin final. Even if it takes her in conflict with people she would rather not fight, in the end, she has no choice but to fight for the planet she was born on. Similarly, the other side is simply fighting for the chance for a home, to live. But in the end, she can't stand down.
"Ah, I see," she murmurs, as Noeline explains the nature of her own impulses. For Avril, it seems, it continues down a different line -- she feels the necessity to do something, so she does it. "So there can be a sort of 'joy' in such actions..." she muses aloud, regarding Noeline with open curiosity for a moment or two. "I have heard some tell of the thrill of battle, or of challenging themselves and their skills... I cannot say I experience such feelings myself, but perhaps it may be similar. In any case, it would seem that you are not alone in such an experience." As methodical as ever, even in her analysis, it seems.
Though she leans over and sets down her cup and plate both as she fully takes in Noeline, the full weight of what the Metal Demon warrior is essentially confessing to her.
Her expression grows ever-so-slightly downcast as Noeline mentions Ida, and the young woman's rather antagonistic take when it came to Metal Demons and their kin. That, it seemed, had not changed. Even in the condition the woman -- and her friends -- were now in.
"And yet, you did not. That does speak well of your intent. It is easy to not do something if you never desired to do it. It is a different matter if your wishes carried you in a different direction and you yet struggled against them." She sits up straight, then, as if a burden she had born has now been lifted.
To have trust in one's past self...
Avril looks no less than thoughtful, as if a concept has been presented to her for the first time for her to carefully inspect.
"...Yes. The same, I believe, must hold for me. I must have faith in the decisions I made were for the best, or were the best that I could have made, whatever they may have been." She breathes out, closes her eyes, and then nods. "...Thank you, Noeline. I had not thought before to consider it in that fashion."
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
"All we can do is try to turn the other cheek, I suppose," Noeline sighs. "And simply do our best to survive, time and time again. The trouble is that, even if I would very much prefer to just take those Tainted we have now, and find a place to settle down and lick our wounds - there are still too many Tainted left behind in the Photosphere. We cannot simply consign them to their fate just like that. Riese would never let herself live it down," she adds quietly, swirling her spoon in her cup more for something to do than to stir her tea.
The motion pauses, just for a moment. "... that all said... I will take up my blade, if need be. That is my decision. Berserk was an absolute barrier to understanding, someone who revelled in destruction willingly - and while I cannot exactly find it in me to celebrate his death at my hands, I certainly will not condemn it either. There was no moving forwards, not while he stood."
There's a pause, as she mulls that over - and then puts it forcibly out of mind, to instead let out an amused little sigh. "I am a Hyadean. Like it or not, martial prowess has been something our race has always admired. It is built into us. I cannot help but feel exhilarated in a fight - which is a bit of a problem when you are supposed to be a cautious spy," she adds with a glum frown that doesn't reach her eyes, not with the light of amusement sitting there instead.
"But that was not my point, so much as-- it would have been incredibly satisfying, in the moment, to simply punch Ida's face in," she clarifies with a remarkable bluntness. "That is the trap. To use 'removing a threat to Wayside' to justify 'what must be done' and turn that into a moment's visceral relief. ... though I suppose you could just as easily twist interpretations such that turning the other cheek was the pragmatic course of action, I suppose. Haah. It really is all interpretations, all the way down," she mutters with a rueful smile.
At least it turns more genuine when Avrl straightens up. "It is not a great mystery. No-one can move forwards while they're trapped in their own head. There may come a time when your fears are confirmed - but until then, all you can do is hold a belief in yourself."
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
"No, I would not expect you, or her, to leave your own kin behind if they continued to suffer, even if to do otherwise would lend the both of you a far gentler life." It's similar in a way to her own dilemma -- in overall structure if not in precise strokes. Where she is going, she cannot say, but she knows her friends will follow her, wherever it leads.
She knows, logically, they had longed for such a journey -- they are not solely traveling for her sake alone.
But she also knows they left a peaceful, normal life behind... because of her.
But they would not be 'them' if they turned away from someone in need.
"I, as well. If there is a need, then I will fight."
It's a quiet promise. Already, she's shed blood. She'll do it again. Without joy, but at the same time, gladly, if it allows them to continue on.
Berserk was slain. Others may yet fall. Perhaps even herself, someday. But she can't back down. "...If it's necessary, to continue to move forward," she completes the sentiment, gazing at the woman seated across from her at the table.
"Still, whether it has been cultivated into your being or not, it is something you struggled against and bested," Avril points out, shifting forward a touch in her seat.
Noeline isn't the only one to smile, Avril's own expression by turns wry. "Hmm. Perhaps so, but at times the most pragmatic cut we can make is not to merely strike down the obstacle in front of us... but to ensure there is no means that we or anyone else may lose their footing over what remains."
It may be a bit of an overextended metaphor, but poetry is still an area where Avril is trying her hand.
Interpretations all the way down... indeed.
Her hands fold in her lap, where she then entwines her fingers. "Some of us are more prone to such wanderings than others, it seems. Fortunately, there will always be people like you, Noeline, to set such wanderings at ease." Her smile gentles, now but a slight but genuine tilt of her lips. "Thank you. I feel as if my heart has been able to obtain some peace."