2021-06-29: Even If It's a Fairy Tale
- Log: Even If It's a Fairy Tale
- Cast: Lan Lilac, Citan Uzuki
- Where: Aphel Aura - Deep Sea Bros.
- Date: June 29th, 2021
- Summary: Citan meets with Lan; well aware that she is affected by the Stranger thanks to his discussions with Gwen, he tries to carefully work out the particulars of the matter.
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
Shevat is a beautiful city. It may be a weirdo floating sky city, but by now Lan no longer thinks of it as 'another Etrenank, but nicer'. In return for their hospitality she's been doing things for the townsfolk when she can, whether it be small deliveries (she doesn't want to step on Gwen's toes) or giving lessons on everything from lacemaking and handicrafts (popular) to herbal medicine (less popular). Some people even thanked her with money or trades or little gifts, which was so sweet!
She didn't really have the heart to explain that she's trying to do community service and that being paid for it kind of defeats the purpose.
Lan has been staying with Gwen most nights for companionship and convenience, though they usually split up to do their own things during the day. So when she got a message from Citan asking if she could meet up with him, Lan was free.
She's got a tall glass of iced tea in front of her, seated at a small table that isn't too close to the door or the counter. She picked this spot in particular for the view... but also with a view toward privacy. "I wonder how everybody's doing back home," she thinks out loud, taking a short pause between sips from a bendy straw. "I guess they're probably fine, but... somehow, being in a place like this feels even more distant from Little Firelight than Aquvy did. It's lucky that you're finally getting to spend time with your family, isn't it?" Lan may be making small talk because she genuinely believes that's why he invited her to meet up, or because she has an inkling that Citan is going to want to talk about something more difficult and she's stalling.
<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
Such is the way of Shevat. With most of the absolute essentials managed by the Queen, all work is essentially community service, from tending the hydroponics gardens and cleaning to work in the research laboratory and soldiering. People rely on one another, and so bartering is common. Most likely, the residents gave her what they could spare just like they would do with anyone else.
Or, as they sometimes do with those from the surface, money, which can be far more useful in the lands below than freshly baked bread, sometimes.
It had been Gwen of all people who had given him cause to think about Lan again. Which is not to say that he functions in quite so a callous fashion, but rather more that between recent events and reuniting with his family, he has had other things to consider.
His tea (hot) is still untouched (it's ended up too hot; Jessie might say he's gone soft) before him. Instead, he's been more taken with the conversation itself, explaining -- among other things -- the path that had taken him back up here to Shevat where he'd reunited with his wife and child.
It seems that the villagers from Lahan are also here.
The survivors, that is.
But even in the midst of that friendly, perhaps even disarming chatter, he's been watching her -- almost making a casual study of her.
The situation isn't the same as Gwen's, he's certain...
"Oh yes? You had come from, ah... what was the name again..." he muses, crinkling his forehead. "Little... yes, of course! Little Firelight was the name. Hmm..."
So this is 'lonely' for her?
He smiles benignly. "Yes... I could not be certain that they had made it here safely," it is a bit of an open secret that Yui is from Shevat, at this junction, "but it was quite a relief. ...It had been about four years since I had last seen my daughter and wife, you understand," he explains, that smile faltering only slightly. "We have all had quite a bit to 'catch up on', as it were."
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
For what it's worth, Lan looks pretty good. Healthy. Like someone who's doing things that are pretty important to her, who's eating well and exercising, and not having lots of impromptu dreamworld visits by a sanity-destroying madman. Heck, she's even trying something new with her hair - just a different way of tying her favorite ribbon, but it counts!
Ice in a drink is something Lan doesn't think she'll get tired of, much like the kind of fancy light that turns on just because someone touches it. She didn't grow up with either readily available. "That's the one," she nods amicably, crossing her fingers together for a brief moment on the surface of the table. "It must've been a huge relief when you found them. Four years..." How long had it been since Lan left her village before she went back, after all? Hadn't it been...?
"I went about three years without seeing my village, but I did go back after a while, to visit." She could have gone back afterward, but... Lan looks down, easy smile dimming a bit. "...I don't think it's safe to go back again now. Since I guess technically Gebler is still searching for me."
Leah doesn't seem to be the type to take hostages or anything, but it's not like Lan really knew her as well as she thought she did. "...It's better not to invite bad luck on them." Besides, she's still on her journey, technically, so... it's not unheard of. "Eh, don't mind me! I'm just a little nostalgic, is all." She waves a hand as if shooing the gloom away physically would work. "So..."
Lan stirs the ice cubes in her glass. Clink, clink.
<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
She does like healthy and well, at least from a cursory inspection from across the table. He'd seen nothing that seemed odd about her earlier, either, from the moment they'd met up here and seated themselves at a table. If he were to do a more thorough examination, in fact, he's certain he wouldn't find anything off about her physiological signs.
But, Citan knows there are a good number of conditions, as one might call them, that don't present themselves physiologically alone. Many people can seem perfectly normal... until they're not fine at all anymore.
Take, for example, Fei and his other self.
"It was," Citan agrees, nodding. Four years. Even knowing his wife and his daughter were probably here, there was no easy way to enter Shevat without knowing someone with the proper key. He hadn't been able to do more than hope they would eventually fall in with an agent (of course he has no knowledge of who their agents were on the surface; he doesn't fault Shevat their caution here at all) who would be able to transmit to Shevat -- even that climb up Babel had been a frail hope indeed. It's fortunate that they had been able to get Shevat's attention...
His own smile fades when she mentions Gebler. "...Yes. I think it is wise for you to keep your distance, at least for now," he tells her. "I am sorry, by the way." Citan pauses, glancing away. "...When we met before, when you were with... her. In truth, I had realized the situation you were in but there was little I could do without raising her suspicions. As it was, I believe she did recognize me..." He sighs, shaking his head.
Only to straighten as she attempts to broom away gloomy feelings and remarks that it is only nostalgia. "No, no, that is quite all right!" he remarks, shaking his head again. "It is understandable under the circumstances." He touches a pair of calloused fingers to the edge of his teacup, only to frown. Is it really still hot...?
"Actually, Miss Lilac," he says after a moment or two more, "I had asked you here because I wanted to speak to you about something." He pauses. "Have you noticed anything... strange about Gwen?"
Is this the subject she had expected him to ask about?
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
Of all the strange things to bring her comfort, his acknowledgement of it does. "See, even if it's sad, it's a good thing that nobody's just telling me stuff like 'aw I'm sure it'll be okay if you go back'. Because it already sort of... felt like maybe I was overreacting. Like 'no, surely they didn't want me back that badly'... But, I've seen a little bit of how... well, how people there are." Lan stirs her drink again, watching the ice cubes swirl. "Like everything is theirs for the taking, like people who aren't from the First or Second Classes aren't even people. Even if it would be a pain to send a bunch of soldiers to Little Firelight just for one lost asset, they just might do it." And that's the scariest part of all, because that would mean...
"With her-- oh. Leah, I mean, the Major." Lan never has been entirely able to put together her complicated, complicated feelings about the other woman. Maybe it's just natural. Because someone shouldn't have that kind of duality to them, not without... being a total basket case or something, right?? "...I wonder if she did," Lan sighs. "I noticed that... she does a lot of things that seem like kindnesses at the time."
"When we -- Loren and I -- told her that I was compromised by the Stranger, she told us to keep it to ourselves, that we might be able to use it to get an advantage over him. And that we should keep it a secret, even if doing so would get other Gebler operatives killed." Lan fidgets a bit with her straw. "It never came to that-- not that I know of anyway, but-- but if you had said or done anything to try and help there's no telling what might've happened." And Citan was only a stranger at the time... even if he could have done something, there was no reason for him to stick his neck out. Even Lan understands that much.
It still stings a bit, but... not as much.
He touches the edges of his teacup again and makes a face. "...Do you want some of my ice?" she offers, because Lan is Lan. "It'll cool down faster. Don't get impatient and burn your mouth-- oh, though I guess impatience isn't really one of your problems," she amends a bit sheepishly.
But when he asks her a question, it's not quite about what Lan expects. "Gwen? I mean... she's got an ARM that shoots energy beams. And she knows the main continent better than I do. But that's probably not what you meant. Is she okay? She's been acting normally -- well, normal for Gwen anyway." Her eyes widen. "It's not... we thought the Stranger got what he wanted out of her..." And how terrible a friend has Lan been if she was so wrapped up in her own junk that she missed something being wrong with Gwen?!
<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
He's quiet for a moment. "If someone had said that it was 'fine' or 'nothing for you to worry about'... that would simply mean that they do not understand Solaris or its motives," he says to her softly, his gaze somewhere off and to the middle of the table they're seated at. "What they would do or, even 'might do'... even I cannot say. It is better to vanish from their sight." If he's from Solaris, what part of Solaris is he from?
Would they even do it if she never returned, just as a means to prove a point? Or have they already looked and, having found nothing, have moved along?
Have they looked?
It's paranoia enough to give someone a lifetime of looking over their shoulder. But perhaps that's the price of freedom from Solaris.
"I do not know," he says of Leah, shaking his head. "She was... an enigma, even in my time. She had become a person of note in the Interior Ministry, but it was only just before my escape," he says to her. "I can only assume that she has continued to rise in prominence." Citan shakes his head. "I am sorry. I do not think that I can tell you more of her, or her motivations."
In fact, given what Lan does say about 'the Watcher'...
Citan closes his eyes a moment as if in thought, then exhales a long slow breath. "...I see. Then it is a fortunate thing that I had done nothing," he tells her, shaking his head again. "Still... it is an unpleasant thing." To have done nothing, and changed nothing.
"Ice? Well, er... I suppose it cannot hurt," he hedges, when she makes him an offer. He carefully scoots the cup (saucer included) partway across the table. "My wife says that I am picky about what I eat. I suppose that applies to what I drink, as well... I have never been fond of overly-hot drinks."
And then he shifts the subject towards Gwen. "She... appears well. But..." He appears to hesitate, uncertain what precisely to say. "There have been moments when it seems as if she is not quite 'herself'. Nothing about her otherwise seems 'off'. But... I have been wondering if it might be a side-effect of 'him', or, perhaps, 'another'. Or, perhaps it might be nothing at all? Perhaps, as you might say, I am merely jumping at shadows."
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
And truthfully that's just it - Lan can only continue to hope, continue to pray, that whatever service she gave while she was asleep was enough. Enough that she'll be granted one small mercy, a reprieve for her village. Surely she was kind enough to someone, surely she was nice enough... Please let her have changed just one heart, in just the right place.
Lan truly, even now, wants to believe that strength and kindness can move mountains.
And even if it's a fairy tale or something, it gives her something to hold on to. A light in the darkness, one last wish when all the stars have gone out.
"It's all right. Even if you knew more about her..." Lan trails off, but picks up her spoon and carefully portions two chunks of ice into his teacup. "Let me know if it's not enough! ...Well, even if you did know more about her, I don't know..." How much of the Leah she thought she knew was real? Maybe every bit as much as Leah showed her. Maybe nothing at all. Which is scarier, really?
His wife said so, huh? "There's not really anything wrong with being picky, I guess. Unless it's a matter of starving or not starving!" She'd gone out of her way to find the tastiest grubs, too. "But even if you don't add more, it'll cool off eventually. It'll just take longer."
Lan takes another sip of iced tea. "Did she... sort of stare off into the distance for a moment? Or did she say something weird?" It's what she's managed to gather about what Lan herself has done, when an outside influence weighed heavy on her mind. "I might not be the right person to ask about it," she admits after a moment's thought. "I mean... aren't I the same?"
<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
"Of course," he tells her, carefully sliding his cup back his way. He smiles fleetingly, more out of politeness than actual feeling, because the subject of the moment is...
"People like that... conceal as much as they show," he says, perhaps picking up on that thought of hers. "And vice versa."
Citan laughs briefly, when she remarks on him being a bit of a 'picky' eater. "I should hope that I have the option of not starving! ...I suppose it has something to do with my upbringing... though then again, I have the luxury to avoid what I would rather, these days," he remarks, as if reflecting on it simply hadn't occured to him before. "Regardless, I prefer not to burn my mouth?" he says, testing the temperature of the cup after a moment more and then lifting it to his lips.
"I have known some people who would take it as an insult if you did not drink what was put in front of you, immediately, and never mind the temperature. Fortunately..."
Fortunately, he has the luxury to avoid such things, these days. Hazing from his senior aside.
"A bit of both, actually," he answers Lan regarding Gwen, after a few moments. "She had said, ah, what was it... something about being able to 'accept' alien parts of herself. Perhaps that in itself would not have been alarming, except... she had not appeared to be 'present'," he explains, thinking back to the most recent episode he'd seen. "I have not spoken to her of it yet. If I were wrong, I did not want to unduly upset her. But it did not seem that she had noticed anything amiss."
'Isn't she the same, Lan asks of him. And the fact that he regards her in quite that distant, concernedly pensive way, suggests...
"...I have wondered, in fact, if it might be the same, Miss Lilac. Have you, by any chance, felt 'odd' or 'disconnected'? ...Though..."
Would she even notice?
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
"That's no way to be!" Lan complains, frowning. "Who would ask someone to burn their mouth out of politeness?!" That sounds like something she'd expect from the villain of a five-gella romance novel! ...But then, people can be pretty ridiculously cruel.
"...You don't think she meant her ARM," Lan says to him, but it's half a question still. Maybe she's wrong. "Gwen... had a different experience, I think, than I did. With the Stranger." Because Gwen, Lan has noticed, speaks about him with a sort of exasperation, or as someone who needs to be set onto a better course. Lan doesn't know how to apply that to a nightmare spinner that would slowly, tenderly, carve her into something new. ...Maybe Gwen's just better at processing it. Maybe it's just Lan that's wrong.
But that's good, isn't it!! That something so bad hadn't happened to Gwen, not in that way. Because Gwen already survived the fire, and still bears the scars to show for it.
"..." She looks down at the surface of the table for a long, silent moment. "I haven't seen as much of it in her. I mean, now and then there might be a moment where she's looking at something that isn't there, but how do you know someone isn't just lost in thought?"
She can feel his gaze on her. Isn't she the same, indeed. "I... sometimes I think I lose a few moments. Like... different than just spacing out for a minute. Everybody does that!" Probably even really serious people. "It happened more when I was asleep, I think. In Solaris. I... didn't really pay much attention to it, but now and then I would just... 'skip' time. People would have said something but it was like I never even heard it. Someone would be waiting for an answer from me, but I wouldn't even remember hearing the question."
She rests her hands on the tabletop, rubbing her thumbs together pensively. "But... only a few times, there've been moments where I was thinking weird. Like... when I had to use what the Stranger gave me. And I started thinking..." She trails off, grasping for words. "...Like not myself."
<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
"Well, ah... I should say, I was not made to drink hot tea, but rather that when I was younger I chose to out of expedience on occasion and paid the price," he explains, trying not to smile too much at the way that Lan gets offended on his behalf. "Please do not worry. My senior used to tease me now and then when I would take time and let it cool, but it was not meant unkindly."
Jessie just sort of... bullies everyone as a habit, anyway.
"I had wondered that. If it was her ARM," Citan replies, gaze turned past her for a moment. "But... I cannot be certain it is that simple. Something about that look in her eyes..." He shakes his head. "Until I know more, I do not wish to burden her with what might only be my suspicions."
He's silent a good deal longer after that.
"I have... begun to understand this," he admits, when she says that Gwen had a different experience. "There is much that I do not know about this... Stranger."
He's found it useful thinking about metaphors. Gwen is a Pawn, perhaps to be promoted on the board, should she reach some critical point.
Lan is the Queen.
But as to what the actual game is intended to achieve...
Or maybe the more accurate question is where it will end.
'Sometimes, she loses time', is one thing she tells him. 'Sometimes, she thinks she's thinking odd things'. He sets down his teacup and rubs at his chin pensively, as if considering carefuly what it is she's telling him.
"...I see," he says, settling back in his seat.
"And what do you think about this, Miss Lilac? Do you find this worrying?" It's an oddly bloodless question to ask. Does she find it worrying to start to think like someone else? Who wouldn't--
"Or do you feel that you have your... unique situation under control?"
<Pose Tracker> Lan Lilac has posed.
"Do I-- of course it's worrying!" she complains, before seeming to remember where they are and lowering her voice. "Sorry. The first time I really used it... went all-out, didn't just... sort of do it half-heartedly was... I tried to kill Gwen with it." Lan pushes her glass of tea away, folds her arms on the table, and buries her head there for a moment. "I felt strange all evening. There was something looming. Something coming towards me across the desert. I..."
'Do you hate yourself?' she'd asked.
Lan lifts her head up, settling her chin on her crossed arms instead. "I felt weird. Because something was out there, and I couldn't leave it alone. I ran from the base, out into the sand, and I kept going until I found her. But I think she was hunting me, too. I... I think she made the first move but I can't remember too well. But we were both..." The sand had been glassed in places where they'd fought. "We weren't fighting to win, we were fighting to... to..."
"I knew what I had to do. I had to kill it - I didn't even really think 'Gwen' when I saw her. She was just a, an enemy. An obstacle. And I had to destroy her. And it seemed so easy. I've never fought a human being like that before. I don't know if I ever will again." Unless she uses the black ribbon, and lets its slither through her veins and wrap her heart completely again.
"And another time I was fighting for my life, I didn't mean to... I showed somebody something awful, an awful memory. I didn't know I could, it never happened before, but it did. And he was really hurt. ...It's not worrying. It's terrifying!"
Lan sucks in a slow, deep breath, holds it, and lets it back out slowly. "...Sorry. I... I want to think I can control it. I have before, when I needed to. When I could be mostly calm." But, she doesn't need to say, battles are not calm. And like every Drifter, she'll have to fight again one day.
<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
'Of course it's worrying!' she blurts out at him, and though he sits up that much straighter, the relatively unflappable doctor doesn't so much as blink, glancing the once about the room. The cafe is not that full of people at this time of day, though there is still the predictable lull, the moment in which they are briefly the center of attention. But, as such things often do, they move on.
And Lan explains to him that she's used this power. Gwen had explained her own side of this story to him, once, if in brief. But now he receives more details about what, precisely, had transpired.
He remains silent until she's done, until she's spent, until she's apologizing to him.
"No... I am the one who should apologize. In truth, Gwen had said that you had fought one another, but she had not spoken of the precise details to me. And... I had only her account. Not your own. What you have told me now is..." He trails out, sighing. He shakes his head.
"It is a difficult situation, to put it quite mildly. Yet, the fact that you have maintained some control at present is no small thing. Cultivating that aspect of yourself may be helpful. ...I am sorry, this must seem anemic advice," Citan says, glancing once up at the ceiling. "Nevertheless..."
He continues after a moment. "I do not mean to demean your own situation when I say this, but there are... others in a similar situation as your own -- with powers they struggle to master. Speaking with them may also help you. You are not alone in this."
After a moment more he picks up his teacup and slowly takes a sip from it. This is a difficult situation. So far it affects largely only Lan. But should it progress...
Hopefully it will not be necessary for him to take action.