2019-05-24: Cake Denied!
- Log: 2019-05-24: Cake Denied!
- Cast: Ivan, Lydia Seren
- Where: Luca - Port District
- Date: May 24, 2019
- Summary: Lydia attempts to communicate her feelings with cake. Ivan only partially gets the message, but rejects it all the same.
===========================<* Luca - Port District *>=========================== Luca is the largest port and second-largest city in Spira, located the southern tip of the archipelago's largest island. Its location as the central port for Spira's surrounding islands has turned Luca into a thriving economic hub; Besaid, Kilika, and a dozen smaller islands all send their goods to Luca for sale, and even the Al Bhed are known to trade here from time to time. The port district is an immense, bustling area. The largest port in Luca brings in ships from across Spira -- from small fishing ships from Besaid to Al Bhed salvage ships to large sailing vessels from Bevelle -- and a massive market to match. A large seawall keeps the waters at bay, with piers extending out past the seawall into the water. BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CIlRCYnZcg
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Ivan is often tasked by the Guard with ferrying information and supplies back and forth between different places, which in many cases requires the use of an actual ferry. And since the next ferry isn't expected to depart for a few hours, Ivan has some time to kill. Ivan has -- shall we say -- a bit of an aversion to freedom, and so he is using the free time for various training exercises in a park. But since he is practicing weird assassin acrobatics, this is almost like play!
And so this is why he has tied himself to a tree branch and is dangling upside-down from it trying to swing his way up. There are a lot of things he doesn't want to think about right now, and it can be hard to keep busy enough to avoid introspection entirely, but Ivan does his best!
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
Lydia has been bouncing around Luca for the past while to try and find cake. The right cake! Talia suggested a 'Spice Cake' and so that is what she had sought out.
Unfortunately for Lydia, the only spice cake she could find were these orb-shaped blitzball cakes with loads of frosting.
She sends a message to the Wayside: 'TALIA! ALL THE CAKES ARE BLITZBALLS'. She eventually decides it's the thought that counts and just picks one out, spending HER OWN MONEY to obtain this cake. Lydia, who imagines it's more likely that Ivan will flat out refuse the cake than accept it, is rather troubled that she would buy a cake for someone who will probably not take it but, she reasons, worst case scenario she can eat the cake herself. There is no law against that.
It's just a little weird to buy your own cake.
But...
Well she'll figure that out when it comes to it, whether she's up to RIP THE SYSTEM enough to eat her own cake. But that's just a backup plan anyway. Maybe Ivan will even have some cake himself somehow!
Regardless, Lydia is about to get on the ferry when she sees...
...She sees someone hanging off of a tree. She sees Ivan hanging off of a tree. She stares for a bit before her lips twist into a sharp grin (with sharper teeth).
She edges towards the hanging Ivan with a large pink box in her hands and says, "Well hey Ivan! It seems that you're a bit tied up for a moment, but so long as you're hanging around, do you have a minute?"
She does not help Ivan down or anything. In fact, distracting him right about now is more likely to make it more difficult than easier, no? Regardless she is keeping an eye on that rope.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
At the sound of an approaching Lydia, Ivan releases from a pike position to dangle again, considering her from his current upside-down perspective. What is she up to? She has a box.
He is a slightly captive audience at the moment, although the point of the exercise is in theory to be able to escape from this kind of situation in a reasonable amount of time if the circumstance arises.
His mouth quirks at the puns. It's a frown, but right now, does that make it technically a smile?? He assumes she is poking fun at him, and has to take a moment to assess the situation and decide if he's doing anything embarassing or not.
... ... ... No, it checks out! This is just physical training! That's in a safe category, as far as Ivan's rules are concerned. If she thinks it's silly, that's her own concern!
All of this processing means that he stares at her for a few scowling beats before saying, "I guess! It depends on what you want."
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
Lydia Seren is totally poking fun, but there isn't malice behind it. It's just, you know, what else are you going to say when you run into someone hanging upside down like this? She has no idea it's training either. For all she knows, Ivan and Talia had a disagreement and she left him hanging like this. It is the sort of thing she imagines siblings doing to one another to give each other shit. It makes her smile a little, though not too much since it reminds her of how for most of her life she hadn't had siblings.
She carefully sets the box underneath Ivan's head. Is this a fiendish trap?! A 'Death' Trap?
No, she just opens the box up and reveals....
The cake. The blitzball spice cake.
"Tada!" Lydia says. "I brought you cake!"
She gives Ivan a thumbsup (a thumbs down by his perspective?) still beaming widely.
There is a moment.
"I brought cake!" Lydia explains.
There is another moment.
"It's your cake. A cake made just for you."
The cake continues to sit there. Lydia draws out a knife. She is no assassin but she knows it's always good to have one sharp implement on you in case you happen to need it. "Do you want to cut the cake or should I?"
She waggles the blade amateurishly between her fingers.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
"What?!" Ivan recoils from the sight of the cake with such force that he swoops through the air in the very arc needed to make a half circle and land perched on the branch right-side up, albeit facing the wrong direction. He pivots to face her again and stands balanced on it, pointing down at her.
"You got it all completely backwards! How did Talia getting you a cake turn into you getting me a cake?! I don't need a cake, you do! And you needed the cake because you were being neglected and turning to inappropriate sources for support!"
Only one inappropriate source, really, but he's trying not to shout about being an evil assassin in public.
"And why is it a blitzball??"
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
"Umm I believe I said you should get me the cake." Lydia says. "Before I ran away. Because I was incredibly embarrassed. Remember??"
She crosses her arms. This does not explain how Ivan getting Lydia cake was going to lead into Lydia getting Ivan cake for that matter. "You've been taking a while on that cake too, so I decided I'd extend an olive branch...cake!"
This isn't going well! Ivan looks like he might run away from the cake! Maybe she should have tried a tricksier method like saying Lubov left a note in the middle of the cake for him and he had to eat the cake to get at it? That could backfire though! He might explode the cake instead! She couldn't be sure.
"Also I said Talia shouldn't get me a cake yet to give you a chance to get me a cake. So I got you a cake, here, and you can even eat it. And...it's apparently your favorite flavor! I asked around!!" Ie: She asked Talia.
She then picks the cake back up because she's not just gonna leave it there. "And it's a blitzball because I couldn't find non-blitzball cakes! I guess it's blitzball cake season and I would've had to wait for a custom order and it'd be more expensive and nuts to that, this is a perfectly good unique cake that is probably delicious!"
"Eat the cake, Ivan." Lydia says. "The cake wants to be eaten...!"
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
"Me getting you the cake instead of Talia was already far enough from the plan -- this is off the map entirely!"
Ivan's brow furrows. "So you got me a cake to shame me for taking too long to get you a cake?"
The messaging might have got a little confused in there somewhere. But whatever this is about, Talia has been involved, and instead of getting Lydia cake like he asked, she has been spreading information about Ivan's cake preferences instead! Talia, why! Ivan feels both plotted against and confused about what the plot is supposed to be.
He unhooks his ankle from the rope and drops down from the tree in front of Lydia.
He takes a closer look at the cake, eyeing it dubiously, like it's a new breed of monster whose capabilities he doesn't understand.
He's trying to think of some way to depersonalize this.
"I don't like gifts and I don't need any cake. Could I like... buy it from you and then give it back to you?"
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
"What? No!" Lydia says. "That's not why I got you the cake at all! It wasn't to shame you at all! Does that really seem like something I'd do?"
She pauses. "Uh. Maybe...don't answer that."
She balances the cake and box in one arm carefully(?) before adding, "I just figured it gave me an opportunity to give you a cake first, you know? Also when I asked Ethius for advice he said I should get you cake first. And he's usually a bastion of good--" She frowns. "He's usually a bastion of ideas." She frowns harder. "Sometimes he says things." She corrects once more before adding, "But I liked this idea."
"...Because it involved me getting you cake." Her cheeks silver faintly. "Why do you hate gifts so much? It's not a trap or anything. I'm not expecting anything but you helped me feel better more than once so--if it's easier for you to think of it as having bought it then--that's how you bought it."
She avoids looking at Ivan directly. She is pretty much failing at asking how he feels because she keeps getting more concerned about how he's feeling.
It's really frustrating.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
She asks if Ivan really thinks she would shame him with cake.
"It does seem kind of an expensive way of shaming if words would work just as well,"
he admits. Lydia provides further explanations of the backstory of the cake, which only worry him more. Who is Ethius? (Ivan didn't take note of his name when he met him, if he heard it at all). Does that mean Lydia consulted more than one person on this plan?
"What do you mean, advice? Why did you need advice? Is there some kind of problem you're trying to solve? Is this about getting me to quit my 'side job?'" Which -- who could really blame her for that? But he is starting to get wound up about all of these plans and consultations about himself apparently happening behind his back.
She asks why he doesn't like gifts, and his energy drops a bit. "...I don't like debt," he says, after a few moments of quiet. "Gifts are always debt, even if they aren't meant to be. And it's like -- kindness debt, and I'm not even qualified to repay that kind of thing."
The idea of it instead being payment for favors he didn't intend to do for her has its own complications. He sighs.
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
"Yeah, exactly! And I'm a known cheapskate ask anyone." Actually they might not agree to that since they're all super sweeties but Lydia isn't actually going to mention that part while it's inconvenient. "And--I guess there is a problem I'm trying to solve? It's ... not really a problem, though, and I guess it's not really about solving it so much as figuring it out? And uhh no, actually, it isn't really about your side job, really--" She frowns. "Wait--when you say side-job you mean your job job right? It's not a side job if it's your main job, right? And if you have a normal job you haven't ever mentioned it. Though uh. I guess I haven't given up on that, though that's not what this is about."r
She keeps dancing around what it is about!
But she does listen to Ivan. She lowers her head a little. It isn't that she agrees with it but she certainly understands the feeling. Riesenlied is often so kind that she feels cruel by comparision no matter how hard she tries to be good. They keep saying she should be her own self but her own self isn't half as nice as her.
"Sorry," She says, closing up the box. If that's how he feels about it, well, she didn't come here to put him into debt exactly. "It's gotta be hard to live in a world where every nice thing someone does for you requires some kind of payback, but I guess I get it. I don't know if I'd say I ever felt it that far, but I've felt that way for like specific things sometimes."
She frowns. "Though I guess...since I wanted to know how you felt about me since you kind of dance around it sometimes that I thought it would help--I mean it wasn't the only thing, I wanted to do something nice... But...agghh... I guess that is kind of like a whole thing like you said!"%r
She doesn't drop the cake or anything it's still cake but she grumps, "Why am I listening to Ethius anyway?? He doesn't get people so much he gets thwapped upside the head like every other day. Agghh..."
She rubs her free hand against her face. "Sorry, I'll uh... forget about the cake I guess. I'll just throw it at someone."
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
"I don't know what the right words are for the kind of job it is, I was just trying to be indirect about it," Ivan says. He realizes there was an implication in his words that maybe he's started to think of the Guard as his 'main' job, and assassination as a 'side' one, which is embarassing, because the Guard are... respectable, and it makes him seem like he's forgotten his place and who he really is. He reddens.
This flustering soon proves to be prescient, as Lydia veers dangerously close to actually telling him what she meant the cake to be about. He doesn't quite put the pieces together fully -- you'd probably have to physically hit him over the head with that kind of information for him to believe he was interpreting it correctly. Possibly twice. But he still successfully intuits that some sensitive feelings are on the line, and that his only available option is to crush them.
His expression wilts a little. "Lydia, I don't... have any feelings. Remember?" He's said it before, or things like it, but somehow it seems crueler this time. It's not supposed to be a cruel thing to reveal. It's not supposed to be news!
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
Next he'll be thinking maybe he only needs one job and from there there's no coming back!
This doesn't stop him from giving what might be the worst possible answer. Luckily, the worst possible answer is the sort of nonsense Lydia has been expecting so she doesn't exactly blow up or snap out at him. Instead she gets quieter as her fingers curl into fists.
"Yes you do." She says softly, but just because it is soft does not mean a soft emotion is behind it. "You don't know what 'no feelings' is like." She says it, in this moment, like she either knows what it's like or knows someone who does. "You just..nghh...I don't want to fight about it." That moment of tension is released. "Just please tell me when you've figured it out 'cause I know how I feel. Mostly. It was nice seeing you again." Somehow that was still true.
The box is closed. Where the cake will go is a mystery, even to Lydia.
Okay no she knows what she's going to do with the cake and it's probably eat it until she has an emotional freakout and throws it at something and then feels bad about throwing it because that's a waste of cake. Why does she always like weird people? Is it because she's weird too? Ugh that's probably totally what it is.
She feels like she should add something in this moment, tie a nice bow around it and maybe get in a nice word in, something nice and poignant or whatever.
But she can't think of anything sort of an outright confession and somehow following 'I don't have feelings' with something like that doesn't feel right.
Instead there is nothing besides a quiet wave, not entirely bereft of hope, before she starts moving on her way...the cake...uneaten!
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Ivan should probably be satisfied that he has successfully disappointed her, even if her retort about his not knowing what it's like to not have feelings is hauntingly specific. His claim is bullshit and they both know it, but at least the message, maybe, has finally landed, that he isn't someone who can fill any kind of void that might be in her life, and she will have to find a real person for that.
Yes, he is technically a human with feelings. But he isn't supposed to be, and he certainly doesn't deserve to indulge them in any way, so he tries not to look directly at them and learn too much about what they're up to.
He kind of wants to elaborate on that-- he feels like he's trodden on an authentic experience of hers by claiming it as his own -- but saying he just doesn't deserve feelings sounds like opening up a negotiation into how he could take control of his future if he wanted to start deserving them.
But there are half a dozen reasons why he can't do that, and he doesn't want to think about those, either. Getting to abdicate from decisions like that-- that's exactly what he needs to pay for with all of these rules limiting the rest of his behavior.
Instead of trying to explain himself further, or saying anything that might make it better, he watches her go with his mouth hanging partway open and a stricken look on his face, his hands moving forward almost to stop her, or even take the box, but just hovering in indecision.