2019-04-01: Interview with the Vampire
- Log: Interview with the Vampire
- Cast: Kamui, Marivel Armitage
- Where: Mi'ihen Highroad, Travel Agency
- Date: 1st April 2019
- Summary: Marivel approaches Kamui about her damage, but the talk turns to one of investigative journalism...!
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
Following the battle at Mi'ihen Highroad, Kamui was dozing off back at the Waystation awaiting Acacia Saitani's return... and later on in the night, the frankly strange mechanical (but not mechaniloid, that's a different term) Reploid girl is perched up atop one of the Travel Agency's high flagposts overlooking a pen of chocobos and the relative peace of night with no Fiends invading.
As much as she fronts about bouncing back from damage, though, circuitry frayed is just that -- and Marivel's no stranger to her taking more and more and more and more damage over a long period of time.
Somewhere, Dr. Lumen's capsules are still working the machinations of their long-passed creator. She's not alone...
But it doesn't mean the going is easy for she who should've been laid to rest either.
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
Humming.
That's the first sign of Marivel's arrival. It's just humming. The melody is pleasant in a way that might not seem very Marivel-like but she isn't stumbling over the tune. She knows the melody of what she is humming by heart. To be fair, it is a simple one that anybody could memorize if they spent some time on it.
And it's a melody not unfamiliar to Kamui as well.
Tis night, and when night falls Marivel removes the heavy shrouded clothing that she so often wears. She is not one who enjoys hiding her identity, finding it a neccessary nuisance rather than an enjoyable prank (especially in the light of how many people just kind of shrug off the whole vampire thing). She comes to a stop once she nears close enough to the flagposts to talk without shouting too much.
"Do you remember me?" Marivel asks, repeating her last question to Kamui. The usual pride, arrogance, and bombasity of Marivel has been set aside. A pair of quiet eyes peers up towards Kamui, focused squarely in her direction.
"Perhaps the better question, though... Is if you wish to. Perhaps tis too early to ask. Still..."
Her eyes narrow faintly. "You gave me a scare. How are your systems? Is there cumulative damage. If there is, perhaps I ought to take a look now rather than after they've been damaged."
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
Kamui turns her head very gently, as the wind flutters and throws that ever-tattering cape around her back. Her shorter hair is less capable of fluttering, though. She slips down from the top of the flagpole next to Marivel.
"Marivel...Armitage..."
Whether this is impressive or not is probably dampened by the fact that she technically gave her name out to Acacia and her on that ship a while back, but...
The way she pronounces it... the way her eyes look at her. A pause.
"... you are... important." A pause, as she pauses and hitches a moment later like her ears should start steaming. The gem at her chest glows.
"... ... I want headpats," she whines. ... i-is that the extent of her remembrance?? And how much she cares about the damage to her systems??! But... as casual and callous as it sounds--
A headpat is a very nostalgic thing, is it not?
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
"Important? How kind of you to say." Marivel says, allowing a small smile on her face. "You are too, you know. Important. So important that tis your words about memories that made me follow you tonight far more than my own will...but I do not wish to hurt you so please do not strain yourself."
Kamui jumps down. Maybe she hadn't taken as much damage as she had feared. Nevertheless, she starts lowering her goggles down in an attempt to gather some diagnostics through the lenses.
'I want headpats'.
Marivel's fingers on her right hand curl faintly inward, mouth hanging open slightly in surprise at the request, the /demand/ even, before it settles into a hapless smile and a faint shrug of her shoulders.
"You ask for a simple boon. I can provide."
She raises a hand up and pats Kamui on the head, slightly brushing her hand down her hair. "I believe...she did it like this?"
She who lived and died as a human, Marivel thinks.
"I just so happened to want to headpat." Marivel says. "So I should thank you, Kamui." She will headpat Kamui for as long as she likes. "Acacia seems to care deeply for you. I can't help but tease her, but she's rather quietly impressive, isn't she?"
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
First things first: Kamui receives headpats.
The reaction: https://66.media.tumblr.com/70617a6bff8464873201ebc439cc57e0/tumblr_p3uybpF4861tjqw6so2_400.gif
Eeeh... Kamui enjoys headpats, perhaps far more than the simple physical gesture can provide. It brings back memories... wonderful, fond memories... memories she can't remember clearly, but whose emotional and sentimental lingering last far longer than more closely to her Suffering Circuit than she can ever explain.
"... she did it... like that," Kamui agrees. Even if she doesn't understand who...
But it all feels so...
Familiar... in the way a sense of gentle, comforting frisson fills someone when they enter a comfortable, cozy lounge in an old home they haven't in a while.
Marivel scans her with her goggles.
The damage is undeniable. Some parts of Kamui from the last great struggle just aren't going to ever come back. There's circuitry that've literally burned out, cables and wiring that need replacements that wouldn't be easy to source, muscular fibre that've thinned out to nothingness. This is a machine that has faced calamities, multiple times.
And she was not meant to reawaken, because of said damage.
But...
A human is fragile too, aren't they? They bleed, they atrophy, they grow old and withered, they break something and it never knits back up right. But they persevere, as if they were more than just the sum of their water, blood and matter. Because of the strength of their emotions, their resolve, and because they cling onto what's dear for them.
Maybe the Suffering Circuit that concluded that she wanted to go out a fourth time, on her own will, is providing something a little extra than the sum of her parts.
"... Master is... wonderful..." Kamui nods. "I'm learning so much about... writing... and photography..."
Has she ever said her name? Acacia.
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
She hasn't. That's concerning, but with damage like Kamui has it seems cruel to press down too firmly upon that point. Acacia can insist on Acacia if she wishes and Marivel imagines that will happen eventually judging from those few glimpses of truth within the journalist.
She's still hurt, though, and the worst of that damage is far beyond her ability to repair. Perhaps this 'Roll' that Dash had mentioned? Dash's condition seems particularly top notch considering.
Humans certainly are fragile creatures. She never thought she'd find Kamui to be fragile herself. She laughs faintly at Kamui's words, though not out of mockery but rather out of nostalgia. "What's most important never fades. I will put my faith in those words, then..."
Pat pat. Pat pat.
"You seem to have taken quite well to your new responsibilities. Particularly photography. Are you having fun?"
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
Perhaps Kamui is a testament that nothing can truly last forever. No matter how advanced the Zeboim were, no matter how brilliant and how much foresight Dr. Lumen had, her creation couldn't have been made to last forever. No humans do this, passing the torch down to future generations.
But what does Marivel think of that?
"... I was going to make her a looot of money ... to replace that refractor," Kamui starts as she comfortably settles underneath the pats. Every subsequent headpat has a multiplicative effect!
"But... it turned out to be fun too. Master taught me about investigation and interviewing people and taking good shots of various subjects and landscapes...!" Kamui cheerfully exclaims, not unlike that of a child.
A pause.
"And she also told me that sometimes, it's okay to just completely fib and write something totally false because people will just believe what they want to hear anyway!"
E-eeeeh?!?!
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
Nothing lasts forever. And yet...
...Yet here she is.
What would you have me do, old friend? Would you have me desperately try to keep her in shape? Repair what I could and leave the rest to rot? Or gradually repair the very circuits that maker Kamui Kamui but if you replace pieces of someone's essence like that...are they still going to be the same once you're done? She doesn't know. Maybe you did, old friend. Maybe she should just be allowed to rest. Or maybe...
Maybe this time will be different. Not off to a great start if so.
Marivel isn't going to stop the headpats. She certainly doesn't have a normal sense of time. She could do this until the sun rises though eventually she might notice Kamui's increased blobbiness and stop out of fear of maybe going...too blob.
"Interviewing people! I haven't seen an interview yet. Do you have any ideas for your first subject?" She is incredibly charmed by the idea of Kamui interviewing someone.
Kamui then admits that sometimes it's okay to just make stuff up. A responsible parent should probably step in and say that honesty is the best policy and that lying to the public can have disasterous effects like a torch wielding mob and even if it means a little less gella it might be best to be non-sensational in your storytelling.
So naturally Marivel doesn't say anything like that. Instead she says...
"It's true. They would, and it warms my cold heart to hear you are growing to understand humanity so quickly."
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
What would Dr. Siobhan Lumen have Marivel do?
Once, they were young and proud and full of life. They thought nothing could shatter their bonds, and nothing in life would take them away from each other. A time when they could very frivolously enjoy things and kind of take them for granted because peace is an extremely intoxicating drug.
But the Good Doctor hasn't run out of capsules yet. Even if she got there in a roundabout way, fighting the errors of her youth, and perhaps hurting a lot of people in the process with insensitivity...
"... but Master sounded so grumpy when she said it. Why is that?" Kamui does at least conclude, as she weans into the context of what it is Acacia probably ranted on as journalists often do when they're faced with the reality that people want clickbaity echo-chamber pieces sometimes. "Humanity is complicated, but..."
Kamui puffs up again in pride.
"Humanity also invented the heated table. Humanity is great, mui."
She really loves that kotatsu, huh....
A blink as she suggests, "Do you want to be... my first interview, Marivel Armitage?" on the topic of interviews as she asks who she's going to first interview. "I can be paid in headpats. Wait, or do I need to pay people for interviews... Master said, sometimes you need to slip money under the table..."
A pause.
Oh no, Kamui is confused.
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
And like most intoxicating drugs, can be fatal if you overdose.
Siobahn had her flaws. Everyone does. But she was well-meaning in a world with many who can't even manage that much. Sometimes well-meaning isn't enough, but she was her friend and one of those capsules may hold the secret to help save Kamui.
Whatever that means.
"Well I don't want to speak for Acacia," Marivel says before doing it anyway. "But my guess is that the practicalities of her profession are clashing with the ideals she saw embodied in it. Tis true of any work. I would be troubled if she was not at least a little grumpy about the truth."
Humanity invented the heating table and that is why they are great.
"I do love them so." Marivel admits. "But I am not unlike Acacia. Sometimes I have to grumble a bit about them. I mean no ill will towards her people."
She does not say who the 'her' there is but, honestly, it could be quite a few individuals now couldn't it? At some point all the Elw had gone, Marivel knows, and she knows not where they left to. The planet feels emptier and emptier and yet smaller than ever.
"I suppose it depends on the one you're interviewing. Let us have an exchange. One interview and as many headpats as you'd like today in exchange for one hug. If you dare...!"
She is full on smiling now. She can't be a grouch around this kid. She's too cute and sweet.
"I will answer any questions you like, even if the answer is 'I will not answer.'." That's still not answering Marivel!! But those are her terms.
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
There was a time when all they had to worry about was not getting yelled at for raising their voices in the library. When all they had to worry about was 'hey, I had that book first!'. When their days were filled with karaoke and kotatsus and mandarin oranges and fun. And then...
"It's okay to grumble. Master grumbles a lot," Kamui replies a little more sedately. "She also told me, I should speak my mind and not bottle my feelings up."
A pause.
"Is there truly... a bottle that can hold feelings??"
She doesn't let herself get super-distracted by the Muisterious Bottle that Can Hold Feelings, though. That's an investigative topic for another time.
"I can hug... I'm an expert-level at hugging!" Kamui perks up a bit more softly. "Then, um, hmm..."
She takes out her Reporter's Badge, as if it were protocol. It kind of looks really shonky and fake and probably won't get her into any limited press rooms. But it does have her picture on it and Acacia probably had to scribble her name and profession out with pen rather than get it printed because it's expensive.
"Here, it's my Reporter's Badge."
She looks down at her notes and reads them out.
"'My name is Kamui and thank you for letting me interview you today.' Note, pretend to be cordial, act interested and project positive body language."
A pause. "That last part wasn't meant to be read out loud."
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
It was a good time. Marivel has never forgotten. Perhaps that is what leaves her uncertain as what to do about Kamui's memories, if anything at all, even if anything were possible... And those times aren't gone. Marivel could go there now if she wished, rest in the warm embrace of such memories...
...But she can't. Like Kamui, she too has her obligations and though they may not be literally etched into her neural net they might as well be. How could she not? In a world full of bad dads, Marivel loved hers more than anything. In a world full of absent moms, hers was always there even if it was in spirit. If it were anything less, would she still shed tears?
"A bottle that can hold feelings...truly?" Marivel considers this as if it were the first interview question. "Well, all of us have a bottle that can hold feelings but tis important to be responsible about it. Not everybody has well made bottles to place their feelings into, for starters, and if you try to store feelings in that bottle they will leak out, possibly at a terribly inconvenient time. Other bottles are so sturdy and secure that if you try to store your feelings in them, they will not get any air and they will suffocate in there and the truth is, nobody wishes for their feelings to starve... tis only when it is too painful, too expensive to upkeep, too busy or too distracted that we place our feelings in bottles...but all of us are social creatures. Even an Adversary of Man needs someone by their side from time to time, and so it is with I. I suspect even the Lords of Calamity need companions with whom they can open up their bottles and let their feelings wander and float about and no matter how scary or dangerous it can feel, tis important to let them do so. Feelings need exercise and can't, /shan't/ be bottled up forever."
She literally giggles into her hand when Kamui does her introduction...including the part she shouldn't be read alone. "We can cut that from the final take." Marivel jokes. "The pleasure is mine, Junior Reporter Kamui. My gratitude at being interviewed by such an esteemed publication is immeasurable."
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
"And I know," Marivel adds about Kamui being an expert hugger. "Tis what makes them so valuable
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
Memories are important.
That's one lesson Kamui knows more than anything else.
But to drown oneself in memory, to coddle one's self and protect themselves with naught but memory, and it may very well be the blanket that chokes the baby. Kamui... does she know that for certain?
It remains to be seen.
"Hmm. Hmm," nods Kamui as she jots some things down. "I have heard of powerful bottles that can even contain faeries. Perhaps emotions are not so outlandish, in the face of such artifacts. But..."
She listens to Marivel's wise advice about keeping your emotion in a bottle so air-tight your feelings starve. "I see... that is a good phrase. I have acquired a good quote for the write-up!"
She exclaims this in the exact same tone of 'I've gotten stronger!' when someone levels up.
A pause, as she nods a few times and says, "What would you say your... job is? What you do as a profession?" It's a pretty standard question, but then again, it's Marivel and such a question surely doesn't have a plain answer that isn't multifaceted. Queen of Darkness, indeed.
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
"Truly, if a bottle can hold a fairy, a bottle can hold anything." Marivel admits, giving Kamui an encouraging thumbs up when she says she has a good quote. Her thoughts on the coddling of memories will have to wait for another day but if one thing is certain, tis that she has spent a long time with them.
She focuses on Kamui's question. She doesn't answer it immediately, though this isn't due to a lack of answer at the ready so much as wanting to express that answer in a particular way.
"Most of my income has come from my work as an Armsmeister." Marivel explains. "But I do not consider that as my occupation so much as an activity I partake in to occupy my time. I am no slacker in the field, nor do I take it lightly, and it is a significant part of who I am...but if I were to pick one profession, I would say that I am the executor of the inheritors of Filgaia, and the executioner of the enemies of Filgaia."
She smiles. "Though in truth, such threats are rarely those that I eliminate myself. Filgaia and its people are very capable of managing most of their enemies. They excel at it. But tis my duty to see that the mortal races of Filgaia receive their inheritance of a healthy bright Filgaia and tis my duty to be the bloody claws of Filgaia should it be neccessary. I suppose for Lunar, that is why Althena has made the Seraphs. I'm sure my people would have been honored to serve as the template for such liches but that is veering into supposition."
She looks up. "Whereas the Elw were the caretakers of life, we the Crimson Nobles are the caretakers of death. Antibodies of Filgaia." She shakes her head. "Well the Guardians may have their own mind, but I believe my people managed as well in their duties as can be expected, even if I doubt humans would see it as such."
She smiles again, not quite bitterly. "But of course, tis not that they fumbled in their duties, tis that they cannot perform their duties anymore. I am the only one who remains that can and so the methods my people would have used are not available to me. With even the Elw gone from this world, the future of Filgaia seems bleak, does it not?"
She smiles. "But I don't think so. As pathetic and weak as humans can be, and often are, I believe in them..." She laughs. "Of course, you could say that I have no choice but to believe in them, but I do. I've seen the lowest that the mortal races can sink, but I've seen the greatest heights too. I would encourage those that deem themselves to be immortal to not forsake the latter in favor of the former."
She pauses and then adds, "But that is how I see my own duty. I do it willingly. Gladly, even though the work does not always make me glad. You, Kamui, need not follow my path. There's many open to you." The smile, just barely, reaches her eyes. "Tis daunting, isn't it, Kamui? But I believe in you too."
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
"An Armsmeister..." muses Kamui. "But, more as a hobby rather than an occupation." She furrows her brows as she-- blinks a few times--
"Inheritor... Filgaia... executioner..."
???
"Was that executioner of inheritors and executors of enemies??"
A pause.
"Big words are big, mui... use littler ones."
OH NO
She does digest the rest of what Marivel speaks, though. There's a lot that she doesn't seem to understand. Lunar. Althena. The Seraphs. The Elw. Maybe once upon a time, she would have such knowledge. Of Elw she worked alongside. Of Seraphs and a manifestation of Althena, in her many adventures.
Such memories are gone.
"... ... ... but, I see. I think I understand. It is like that of... Marina Irington's bakery," Kamui concludes.
... the bakery??
"There are many pastries that Marina Irington and her aunt create daily, beginning at five before the sun rises. Theirs is a duty that many people overlook because they are sleeping and the cuccos have not cucc-a-doodle-dooed. Pan au chocolat. Croissant. Spelt five-grain. Ham cheese quiche."
A pause.
"Some of these pastries... will bring you to the mui depths of the 'Dark World'. And others to a buttery 'Valhalla'..." A longer pause. "But despite the trials and tribulations of souffle that collapse, the joys of the fresh tear of breakfast baps spurs them onward."
...
...
"I forget where I was going with this..." Kamui adds. "But, I think I understand. Then... I think I have-- two questions. Two questions that are very important to me, Marivel Armitage..."
She pauses as she holds her notepad.
"What is a hero to you..."
A pause.
"And what is a Maverick?"
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
"Tis the other way around, but your point is well made. I will use smaller words." She spreads her arms wide from side to side. "For the people...! For the reading public...!! I shall use smaller words!"
She uses smaller words. "I am here to make sure that Filgaia is there tommorow. That is my job."
Even Marivel hasn't worked with Seraphs before. Or at least, she didn't seem to know what one was upon first encountering one. She knows what the Elw are but did she work with them? Hard to say, hard to say. She doesn't speak of Althena beyond pointing out she made the Seraphs.
"Marina Irington." Marivel says. She doesn't say anything else for a time, listening to Kamui's explanation.
Honestly it would be a miracle if Marivel understood what Kamui was getting at there right? She's surely not going to compare her work with that of some random baker and her aunt??
"Yes that does sound approximately accurate. Let's say 98 percent."
Oh okay maybe she will.
Then Kamui asks Marivel what a hero is. And what a 'Maverick' is. Marivel's smile fades and she raises her hand to give Kamui a smaller headpat.
"..."
She doesn't answer it for a while either. She just quietly does this for a while.
What is a hero to her?
"As implied by your question, tis important for all of us to come with their own idea of what a 'hero' is. For me, a 'hero' is naught but a mirage cast by those who sign brightly, irrespective of their intent."
She closes her eyes for a moment.
"As for what a 'Maverick' is..." headpat. Headpat.
Then a crooked smile.
"Well, I'm afraid that is a question I cannot answer. You will have to tell me one day when you find out."
<Pose Tracker> Kamui has posed.
"Smaller words are precious. Isn't it often lamented that small talk is a disappearing art? We must fight for the small word. Because big word is oppressing the small mom and pop words," Kamui natters in a way that's nearly incomprehensible, but perhaps it makes perfect sense to Marivel because honestly she kinda operates on the same wavelength.
"To make sure Filgaia is there tomorrow... that is a good line. And a good job."
A pause, as she nods for a few more moments.
"Marina Irington's bakery is good. Ashley Winchester lives there, too, I'm reminded." Because he's been established as being in ARMS, off-screen, with her.
But her important questions...
"Nothing but a mirage cast by those who sign brightly..."
A pause.
"A shadow, which naturally, forms the shape of a person. But it's impossible to understand what the person really looks like, acts like, feels like, just from a shadow alone. One can get a surface understanding... but no more than that..."
A pause for headpats, because her headpat gauge is nearly full. Limuit Break!
"... ... so even you do not know what a Maverick is. Truly, it is a muistery for the ages," Kamui expresses. "I do not even know where to begin. Is Maverick a person? A place? A box? A bottle for faeries and feelings to dwell in? But... I promise you this, Marivel Armitage."
She nods quietly...
-=KAMUI LIMUIT BREAK=-
Then she gives her a hug. Because she promised. An expert-level hug, which is done not by the programmed rotes within her neural net of what a 'hug' is.
But a hug that comes from her Suffering Circuit.
"When I do find out... I will tell you."
<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.
"I am glad that small words have a champion as thoughtful as you."
Marivel does not comment on Ashley or Marina any further. A time traveler's perogative here. But she does nod slowly to Kamui's read of her own words. "It seems you understand."
Is a Maverick a bottle for faeries and feelings? Is it a person? What is a Maverick? It's true that Marivel doesn't know, not really, but she knows of the battles against 'Mavericks'.
But...
...Well, no. Tis Kamui's journey. And it's proven as such when Kamui steps forward and hugs her. An expert level hug. A hug powered by suffering?? Well they have both suffered so it's fair. Marivel just closes her eyes and appreciates the moment. It is a little like being smothered in a memory.
"I look forward to it." The more genuine her smiles are, the sadder they become but it's a sadness that is hers alone, just like in moments like these the silence is hers, and it's something no soul devourer can consume. She won't let it. Never. Ever. She'd sooner walk into the sun. And there is a kind of fondness for the sadness that spawns such sad smiles too. There isn't an ounce of regret in those smiles. Rather, it is because there are no regrets that she can smile so sadly. She has nothing to blame for her sorrow besides herself and her enemy.
She knows it.
She appreciates it for it is proof, far better proof than checking one's pulse, that she was alive.