2020-01-28: What My Values Are: Difference between revisions

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     In its own way, it's a better response than if she had said she felt empty.
     In its own way, it's a better response than if she had said she felt empty.
     In its own way, it's a worse reponse than if she had said she felt empty.
     In its own way, it's a worse response than if she had said she felt empty.
 
    "...Ah," responds the doctor simply. "I see."
 
    Every day since she died.
 
    It is said, he has heard, that there is no easy transition from living to dead. As with many things in life, there is a slow gradation; greys fading into black. And he has heard that sometimes, a soul becomes stuck in transition.
 
    A limnal state, some might put it -- neither here nor there. And for her, in her condition -- movement in either direction is denied.
    So he has been given to understand, that is.
 
    Were this live steel -- were they fighting for a ''reason'' and not simply for him to gauge her ability so best to know how in which directions she needs to grow (and for her to show him of what she is capable) -- this would be a dangerous situation. A blade can be broken like this. A blade can be wrenched from its users' grasp. And it leaves them open to outside interference as well, as long as one is locked in this dance. Even here, Citan frowns -- faintly -- feeling the blade bend ever so slightly in his grasp.
 
    A broken training sword is not the aim of this.
 
    "I see," he says, to her remark, shifting his weight, pushing back against her own blade while keeping his posture well-balanced, feet wide on the floor. "You do not feel as if this is really your 'power'. You feel as if you are borrowing someone else's strength. ...Is that right?"
 
    She shifts back and only his own earlier reflection prevents him from pressing the advantage, a fact that soon proves to have been a correct decision. He draws back in similar fashion if with perhaps more fluidity, each movement slipping into the other.
 
    Not quite Fire -- not the moments between motions. But Water: connectivity.
 
    The lock thus is broken by the both of them. He stands there, sword raised in a high guard.
 
    "I have found," he remarks, his gaze lingering on her, "that when people say something is good enough, or that it is fine as it is... often this is an attempt to accept things as they are. To placate one's ego, if I may be so blunt. I understand that you are in command," command is not perhaps the best term for the relationship, even now, "of a power that is greater than many may lay claim to even if they applied themselves to practice in one art or another for the rest of their lives. This power is something that you gained by chance, by appearances. ...Are you satisfied by this, Miss Croze? Or, perhaps..."
 
    He doesn't finish his sentence, trailing out as she wonders how long she might have to keep going like this. What was it for.
    Who is her enemy?
 
    His answer for that is to strike, a simple and forward motion as he steps out of the guard, moves forward, and adds that short bit of momentum to the blow.
 
    "The best answer is to start from the beginning. For what purpose did you decide to fight to begin with?"
</poem>
 
<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.
<poem>
    She feels off.
 
    In its own way, it's a better response than if she had said she felt empty.
    In its own way, it's a worse reponse than if she had said she felt empty.


     "...Ah," responds the doctor simply. "I see."
     "...Ah," responds the doctor simply. "I see."

Latest revision as of 01:26, 1 July 2020

  • Log: What My Values Are
  • Cast: Citan Uzuki, Lunata Croze
  • Where: The Thames - Market
  • Date: January 28, 2020
  • Summary: As was promised, Citan has a sparring session with Lunata, to better understand of what she is capable... and to begin to understand where she must grow. First the basics and the foundation, and then...

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    Citan had suggested wooden swords.
    At least to start, he'd said.

    Start with the basics. She has been fighting with steel, certainly, and there are advantages to training with a real sword -- among them being a formal lesson in care -- but somehow, Citan does not think that 'care' is the largest of Lunata's needs at the moment.

    Nor one she is likely to learn, in her condition, from a blade.

    "I admit, I may be somewhat rusty," he says before they begin, testing the balance in the borrowed wooden sword. "It has been some time since I have last sparred."

    Even in this he has become somewhat lax -- without Yui, he hasn't had the option available to him, truly.

    But perhaps in this it is for the best. An opportunity for the both of them.

    There is one other reason he had opted for wooden swords--

    He takes a moment to watch Lunata, studying her posture, watching for all the little signs that an opponent's body can speak without them even being aware of it.

    "When you are ready," he informs her, taking up a guarded stance himself, blade held in two hands.

    "I would like you to try to break through my guard, Miss Croze."

<Pose Tracker> Lunata Croze has posed.

    Lunata had been looking particularly stressed out when Citan found her; for a moment, even, she had to look at him and kind of perceive whether or not he was... real, or some other kind of perceived hallucination.

    She's pretending to be okay, as she holds onto her wooden sword.

    "I understand," she murmurs quietly, wiping her brow. Her eyes betray her, flitting left and right for a moment. Like she's still keeping an eye for something.

    Then she focuses on him.

    She breathes out.

    Her posture... her posture is 'classic', perhaps is the best way to put it. A low stance with a strong position for her knees, with the sword placed behind her with her hand ready to draw.

    But she's not entirely comfortable in it.

    "I'm going."

    She darts forward; her left knee moves low and her foot twists and pivots, as she enacts a basic quick-draw.

    It's strange, perhaps. There is the muscle memory of elegance, an ancient art passed through from elder swordmasters. Yet in that muscle there is the tension of someone who hasn't quite made it theirs.

    A waitress from Adlehyde.

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    He can see it. He could see it, when he had first approached her. Something has left her unsteady in this world, and while he has had chance to observe her in the past -- to draw his own conclusions about what it is that may gnaw at the young woman -- he does not know Lunata Croze and her tribulations.

    So he can only guess what it might be now. Certainly not remark on it, or seek out whatever it may be.

    Instead he focuses on what he does know about her -- and her skill.

    Her own stance is classic. But then classics are classic for a reason.

    He studies her as she shifts, not moving a muscle from where he awaits her.

    There's an advantage to being an amateur. All the skill in the world can block you into a corner, drive you to think yourself undefeatable.
    Leave you vulnerable and open to the unexpected. Leave your instinctual responses exploitable.

    Beginner's luck is no mere concept.

    And yet, one does not remain an amateur -- for ignorance and lack of skill itselves are clearly no guarantee of success. Many a callow youth has set out into the world to make some change or another only to be flattened by the weight of the world.
    The truth is that there is no assurance in anything. No place where you can stand tall and remain undefeated. Uncertainity and doubt can be your truest allies in this world.

    There are a few ways in which Citan Uzuki considers himself a fortunate man. The first being, he is not the best swordsman in the world and that he is well aware of that fact. The second being that he married Yui. And the third--

    Very much, the way in which Lunata moves puts him in mind of the way he has seen a marionette dance and sway at the puppeteer's urging. No, this time no other force pulls her along, but it is the movement of someone who has learned to fight by being pulled.

    So in that moment she is for him, wooden blade raised.
    He doesn't parry the swing. No--
    He shifts sidelong.
    Then, reining in the force of the strike, swings low for the small of her back.

    Enough to sting, maybe. Perhaps enough to knock her flat if it were at an unfortunate point of her attack. But hard enough that she may feel it.

    He'll do her no kindness in the long run by going easy on her, and perhaps that is also why he says, blade lowered and held loosely in his right hand alone:

    "Miss Croze... something is on your mind."

    Unspoken, then: the question of what it is that nags her.

<Pose Tracker> Lunata Croze has posed.

    *SMACK*

    "Rrngh--!"

    His movements are fluid. Lunata isn't slow. Many of her techniques has her moving so fast that she becomes a blur on the battlefield. No, this isn't about speed.

    This is about comfort.

    The ease and comfort in which he slips into her blindside and swings, enough to sting, and causing her to tumble out of it.

    Ah.

    He has a front view of it.

    The way the puppeteer's movements unravel as the strings snap, and Lunata's recovery is all but entirely clumsy; untrained. She skids to a halt, then turns around and readies herself again.

    That puppeteer is there again.

    There is no harmony in this.

    "... yeah," Lunata admits. "I'm not exactly a peaceful fellow these days... and that's not helping me get better."

    That stance assumes again; it's as if the stance assumes her. There's frustration in the movement. The frustration of something that's so instinctual to be muscle memory... and yet something that isn't yours.

    There is no freedom in this.

    She tries again. She didn't expect a direct attack to work; she thinks of feints--

    --and the body translates. She begins to draw, low on the right; her torso pivots, and she strikes from the left.

    But it's still terribly clinical in movement.

    There is no expression in this.

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    Absent all other concerns, it's an interesting thing to watch happen.

    Absent all other concerns, it's a disconcerting thing to watch happen.

    He had thought, with a wooden sword--

    But he has been wrong before about things, and this is a situation about which he knows little, only what he has gleaned from his place nearer to the sidelines as an observer.

    Faintly, the doctor frowns, though the expression is there and gone before she faces him again.

    There is a natural fluidity to movement in living things.
    This, long ago, was among the more important lessons his grandfather had imparted to him. How strange that he had always been drawn to the artificial, then, the comparatively awkward, jolting, unharmonious movement of machinery.

    But then there is no harmony without disharmony. That was also part of what he had learned.

    Still, this... no, this is no mere contrast of animate and inanimate. This is the disharmony of...

    "Would you care to speak of it? I am willing to listen," Citan offers, all the meanwhile shifting his stance back into a guarded posture, as if to stand at the ready for her next strike. "A nagging thought can be a distraction when learning, or even when fighting. ...I am certain there are those who would disagree. There are many who express themselves and the feelings they do not show through their blade. However, as for myself..."

    She moves, and she moves like someone who doesn't know why she moves, the purpose to which each step and shift and movement in space brings.

    She moves, and she moves like an artist's model, carefully moved into a position that is only a semblence of real feeling.

    She comes in from the left.

    It's only natural then for his own practice sword to come in to meet hers, on the right.

    A crack resounds; he can feel the power of her strike -- even in a friendly sparring match -- resonate down his arm. He ignores it; he leans in, twisting his blade against hers in an attempt to lock the both of them up.

    "What do you feel, when you fight?" he asks her, quite directly. "Forgive me for being so blunt, but I am curious." Excitement, hatred. Fear, confidence. Even peace. He's heard of a number of reasons, over the years.

    But what sort of thing does someone who uses such an empty form feel?

<Pose Tracker> Lunata Croze has posed.

    She moves, without knowing why she moves. She moves, with only a semblance of feeling. Their swords crack and resound.

    "... I feel ... off."

    She squeezes the grip of her wooden blade and twists it, and their weaponlock continues; there's a quiet grunt as she maintains her form, best as she can able.

    "Ever since the day I died, I feel off."

    A weapons-clashed situation can be said to be one of the most lethal situations a duelist could find himself in.

    They need to push and exert force and meet that which is being asserted against them.

    Yet both sides are desperately trying to find ways to avoid that force. To go around it. For to endlessly push against the inexorable would only destroy them.

    "I won that tournament -- the Lacour Arms Tournament. But I don't feel I did. It felt like an empty trophy."

    She grimaces further, as she makes the motion of pushing -- and then darts away, as another feint.

    The gap between that false motion and her true intention is glaring. She can't hide it well. She's not a masterful combatant.

    "Every time I fight, I feel like I'm wearing someone else's clothes. The sleeves are floppy, the fit is tight; the look is wrong."

    She grimaces a bit further, as she readies herself for the next attack. Her guard looks a bit shaky.

    "I thought to myself that that'll have to be enough. I was just a waitress. I got an opportunity to be able to fight. Isn't that a miracle?"

    She's loosing her breath quite rapidly; it's not that she has to, it's that she feels quite anxious and tense right now.

    "But in the end I only got more questions. How long was I going to fight in someone's body like this? What was it all for in the end? And..."

    Those words prickle her again.

    "Who is my enemy...?"

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    She feels off.

    In its own way, it's a better response than if she had said she felt empty.
    In its own way, it's a worse response than if she had said she felt empty.

    "...Ah," responds the doctor simply. "I see."

    Every day since she died.

    It is said, he has heard, that there is no easy transition from living to dead. As with many things in life, there is a slow gradation; greys fading into black. And he has heard that sometimes, a soul becomes stuck in transition.

    A limnal state, some might put it -- neither here nor there. And for her, in her condition -- movement in either direction is denied.
    So he has been given to understand, that is.

    Were this live steel -- were they fighting for a reason and not simply for him to gauge her ability so best to know how in which directions she needs to grow (and for her to show him of what she is capable) -- this would be a dangerous situation. A blade can be broken like this. A blade can be wrenched from its users' grasp. And it leaves them open to outside interference as well, as long as one is locked in this dance. Even here, Citan frowns -- faintly -- feeling the blade bend ever so slightly in his grasp.

    A broken training sword is not the aim of this.

    "I see," he says, to her remark, shifting his weight, pushing back against her own blade while keeping his posture well-balanced, feet wide on the floor. "You do not feel as if this is really your 'power'. You feel as if you are borrowing someone else's strength. ...Is that right?"

    She shifts back and only his own earlier reflection prevents him from pressing the advantage, a fact that soon proves to have been a correct decision. He draws back in similar fashion if with perhaps more fluidity, each movement slipping into the other.

    Not quite Fire -- not the moments between motions. But Water: connectivity.

    The lock thus is broken by the both of them. He stands there, sword raised in a high guard.

    "I have found," he remarks, his gaze lingering on her, "that when people say something is good enough, or that it is fine as it is... often this is an attempt to accept things as they are. To placate one's ego, if I may be so blunt. I understand that you are in command," command is not perhaps the best term for the relationship, even now, "of a power that is greater than many may lay claim to even if they applied themselves to practice in one art or another for the rest of their lives. This power is something that you gained by chance, by appearances. ...Are you satisfied by this, Miss Croze? Or, perhaps..."

    He doesn't finish his sentence, trailing out as she wonders how long she might have to keep going like this. What was it for.
    Who is her enemy?

    His answer for that is to strike, a simple and forward motion as he steps out of the guard, moves forward, and adds that short bit of momentum to the blow.

    "The best answer is to start from the beginning. For what purpose did you decide to fight?"

<Pose Tracker> Lunata Croze has posed.

    A state in-between. Neither here nor there. The absolute lack of a decision, one way or another. Being trapped in the interstice of being and not being;

    A condition of absolute denial.

    Lunata's eyes track Citan's movements. There is, at least, a student in there. Someone who's staring with curiosity, the way muscle memory never could get her to ponder.

    You can't ponder and be interested in learning something that's as reflexive as breathing to you, after all.

    "Yes..." Lunata answers. "And you say it's 'greater', but..." She pauses for a moment. Searching her mind. "To me, it's like... like when you have a nail, right? And you need a hammer. But I have the... fist of a Gear, and even if that's much more powerful, it's not more useful, or beneficial to anyone. Does that comparison... make sense?"

    In a way, that's her answer. She's not satisfied by it, because raw power without definition, without reason, without meaning--

    --is as useful as crashing your house down to sink a nail, it would seem.

    Citan strikes.

    She adopts a guard that isn't classic; it's crude, a deflection technique that's meant to let his blade slide down hers while she twists.

    The theory is sound. The execution is not. This isn't a swordmaster's muscle memory. This is a novice waitress's own attempt at it.

    Then she answers:

    "I ... didn't."

    She gets struck for her trouble, because his form is far more refined. She doesn't flinch too hard, though.

    "I was always a timid waitress. I liked avoiding trouble. I'd try to diffuse and shy away from conflict whenever I could. I'd bend to others' wills, calling it part of customer service."

    She lowers her head.

    "It was an accident, my being this way. When Bart and the others joined my mother in excavating those 'Singing Ruins', when we uncovered that Gear... when I fell in its cockpit and begged it to save my mother's life for my own."

    A pause.

    "Maybe that's why I don't have an answer..."

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    Citan has never been a teacher.

    Not in the sword. Not in any form of martial arts. Not hardly in many other spheres he has traveled in. He has, all his life, been the student. First to his grandfather--

    To teach is no easy matter, and in this, he is again the student. His first instinct was still correct -- if he coddles, she learns nothing.
    But he still has to modulate (more than he already is), and this is the point where finesse is needed: if she cannot gain traction, she also learns nothing.

    So he's watching her -- as she watches him.
    He has to loosen up his guard now, without it becoming clear that's what he's doing.
    It's easier to excel than to deliberately not excel. Though in the latter, at least, he has some experience.

    "Yes, it does. Having 'power' in and of itself -- no matter whatever others might think -- is not useful. Having both power and the means to control, direct, and modulate it, on the other hand..."

    He takes that moment -- the moment after -- to strike.

    Her guard is inexperienced. Nakedly so. He creases his brow as she twists her blade against his. In the other strikes she demonstrated skill, even if it was skill not her own, but this is... did the power granted to her teach her little of defense?

    It's power not entirely her own. It's power that focuses on destruction above all else. The comparison is not entirely exact, but still, Citan is reminded of none other than...

    His blade slips past her guard, strikes her. She doesn't flinch much, which is promising; he draws back in the next moment, as if to prevent too much in the way of a return strike, as he would in a duel against an opponent of equal measure.
    Only he takes a fraction too long to do so, this time.

    This is, itself, a test. Is she able to see an opportunity presented to her and seize it?

    "...I see. Is that a life to which you would return, if you were able?" he asks, again assuming a guarded stance, blade held lower than before.

    "Ah."

    Chance, she says. An accident.

    "I will assume that if I told you many people fall into their roles in life by accident, it would be no consolation to you," he says, pairing the remark with a rueful smile. "I am not so old yet that I do not remember what it was like to be your age. No," he says, shaking his head, "instead, I would remind you of your decision. You desired to save the life of someone else, even if it would cost you your life. Some would say that decision reflects bravery and kindness, if not a certain amount of recklessness." Faintly, he grimaces. "In that, you and Fei are not that different. So, no, perhaps it may be 'by chance', but..."

    He shifts his posture, then with a nod of the head urges her to try again to strike him.

<Pose Tracker> Lunata Croze has posed.

    Did the power not teach her how to defend herself?

    Perhaps so, perhaps not; perhaps it is Lunata's own way of consciously trying to apply her own learning, even if doing so is literally about as hard as consciously forgetting to breathe and blink and instead do something completely different.

    "I've fought and lived through the war with the Hyadeans now. And the more I think about it... the more I've come to realise I have no interest in this kind of power."

    She sees that opportunity and strikes back; yet, once more, she's consciously using her own knowledge, than that of another's. She meets that gap, but it's with an inexpert strike; she swings a bit wild, a bit loose, leaving herself with little room for recovery.

    But there's a seed of potential there, unnurtured.

    Is that a life to which you would return, if you were able?

    Citan speaks further. That many people do not choose their roles. This was... something she always knew, instinctively, from the Drifters she saw; she needn't look further than Fei for that, after all.

    "... I felt... that if my life came to an end because I saved my mother's, I would be content with that. But this exchange..."

    Does that mean her desire to save her mother was conditional after all? That's a dark thought that she doesn't like.

    "There is someone very close to me who has what I think is true power. She walks forward without letting the doubt in her mind and heart stop her. She has the magnetism and charisma to draw and influence others, as inexorable as a wind or the tide of the ocean."

    Her lips purse for a moment.

    "Maybe when I ask who my enemy is, I'm showing that I lack having that clarity of purpose..."

    Citan urges her to proceed once more.

    And she does so -- once more, consciously going on her own merit; there's a low stance, a stoop, a swoop -- a crude quick-draw of her own.

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    It's impossible for him to judge at a distance. Perhaps, he fleetingly reflects, Sigurd might have more information, given that Bart was involved, but--

    There are enough risks communicating with the other man at a distance. Best not to chance it. Not yet.

    "I see," he replies, evenly. "Though I dare say many might feel similarly. Very few people, in my understanding, wish to live in a time of war. Those who would..." He grimaces, faintly, then shakes his head. "Though I suspect that may be little comfort to you."

    It may only be cold comfort, with her stuck in a limbo state between living and dead.

    The bait is taken; she strikes, though the blow is a glancing one to his hip; if it had been a live blade, it may have been costly for the strike against mobility alone. He continues his retreat away from her, assumes that guarded stance.

    If he had been fighting in earnest rather than to assess and coax her -- if that mistake had been made by accident rather than intention -- perhaps then he would have taken that opening she presented and finished it before he made another mistake. But this is not that; he is no longer that.
    Now, he is...

    "Often... we do not have the opportunity to determine the degree of our sacrifice," he says, shaking his head. "Otherwise... I suspect that there would be a great deal fewer lives lost in vain."

    It's a dark thought -- one that he has also noted. But in this, he cannot say he is any better.
    He, also, has his conditionals, while knowing he might never have the chance to declare his terms.

    "...Ah. So you have someone such as that in your life. Now I understand. ...And you wish to follow her?"

    In this, Citan can truly say he understands the sentiment. To know someone who is as a force of nature unto themselves...

    "Some of us are by nature leaders. Others, followers. I, myself, fall into the latter camp. I am not given to command, I am afraid."

    Which is when again she laments her clarity of purpose.

    "You are by no means the only one. For some, it is enough to assume another's vision as their purpose, and follow through to see it achieved. For others--"

    He moves to block, because to do anything else would be an insult to her. Her form is rough-hewn. Crude.

    But it's more her own than most of her skill he's seen her present today.

    He moves just a fraction too slow. Enough that she has the chance to crack her wooden sword at an inoportune angle at his own, which forces him to actually shift his stance and press back to correct for it, lest he lose control.

    "...You have the right instincts for fighting," he remarks. "To see an opportunity and seize upon it... I wonder, is that from your 'power'? Or is that from 'you'?"

<Pose Tracker> Lunata Croze has posed.

    "I think it's rare for someone to really be able to live free of war in Filgaia," Lunata admits. "Adlehyde was peaceful enough for a time. But even then, there were refugees from Lahan, from the Frontier... it wasn't like war wasn't lurking around. And then I got caught in Port Timney's Malevolence case... then the Metal Demons."

    Citan retreats away from her strike; her blow is shallow. Her posture isn't perfect either, and perhaps it's a credit for her, silently, that she can identify this.

    He asks if he'd like to follow Jacqueline.

    ...

    "I used to," Lunata answers. "But slowly, it got more and more painful. Seeing her throw herself headlong into the next battle. First it was Mother. Then it was Odessa. Then the Trial Knight. It made me wonder if they were my enemy..."

    She lowers her head.

    "... or if I was fighting my own circumstance all on my own. I don't think her battle will ever end, because she's fighting the times itself."

    She hisses quietly as he presses back, and she twists and readies her guad again.

    "I guess my life changed because of that opportunity I seized. But now I don't know what it is that I see..."

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    His gaze grows darker at mention of Lahan -- but then, he was from there, or rather, lived there once.
    "I suspect it is the same on Lunar -- or at least in Spira. Of the rest of Lunar, I cannot speak. Based on what Fei has told me, however..." He shakes his head slightly. "At times I wonder whether 'being at war' is an inherent part of the human condition."

    Everywhere he looks, he sees war -- where it rages now, where the embers simmer, where the scars remain. A world where everyone is fighting everyone, it seems. And for what?

    "..."

    Her posture isn't perfect, but he expects nothing less -- if there were perfection, he would have nothing to offer.
    He has not attained perfection himself, nor does he want to, anymore. To attain perfection in this art would mean...

    She used to. But it became more and more painful.

    "I see..."

    Citan says, as he continues to test her guard, to continue to press her. "I understand. It is a difficult thing to watch someone put themselves into danger time and time again. Even if you were to fight at her side, it is no guarantee of her safety. ...And, to fight without end is an exhausting task."

    Especially since Jacqueline is fighting the times itself.

    A world creeping ever more assuredly towards then.

    'The Time of the Gospel'?

    "...Nevertheless, it would be a poor world if we were all content to watch what was happening without struggling against it. ...Though that does not help your own situation, Miss Croze."

    He strikes quickly now, testing her guard with a strike with little-to-no fair warning, the sort he would try against someone with reflexes that matched his own.
    How are hers?

    His last test, for now.

    "...In the end, I suspect... what you want, what your aim is, what you see before you... these are things you must determine for yourself. I am afraid I can give you no answer."

<Pose Tracker> Lunata Croze has posed.

    "I don't believe in that."

    Her eyes glint, and for once -- for once, there's a glimmer of raw instinct; far too fast for it to be a conscious decision, and yet... not the refined, elegant parry of a swordmaster of days of yore.

    But she manages -- and actually holds her blade diagonally against her shoulder and lets Citan's strike glide against hers and steps into his guard.

    ...

    She doesn't actually have a follow-up. A master could've applied a technique from a different school, perhaps an elbow strike or a momentum throw or a leg sweep.

    She has very little hand to hand and martial expertise.

    But it's there. There was something she did on her own.

    "I..." Lunata answers, while they're looking closer, eye to eye. "... think struggle and conflict are inevitable, the moment a second human being exists, sure. But I don't think it has to be war. I think we're capable of living without it."

    It's a strangely optimistic view from someone who's holding so much stress and despair.

    She steps away, awkward as it is to have no follow-up.

    "... yeah ... I kinda figured it'd be something I need to find myself."

    Don't you have any desire to enjoy your fate?

    Her head whips about, as if seeing some demon over Citan's shoulder again. But then she regathers her focus and makes a plan.

    "I'm gonna... practice some more, and then I want to spar against you again, at that time, Mister Citan," Lunata speaks up. "When I have more answers. To Sigurd and the others. To Jay and Lunie... to the Wolves, and... to myself."

    She reaches towards her pocket and puts on a pair of glasses. She doesn't behave like someone who needs it, but it's old and worn enough to indicate to Citan that she must have needed them before, in her old life.

    "I'll figure out what my values are."

<Pose Tracker> Citan Uzuki has posed.

    Wooden blades meet, with a solid thunk.

    She steps into his guard. Here, another -- better, perhaps -- fighter might have followed up appropriately. He would have expected it, hopefully knowing his opponent well enough to guess whatever it was that he might do, and have taken steps accordingly.

    He makes no move to do anything, perhaps as much anticipating what happens as he might be curious to see what she might have tried.

    "I don't think it has to be war."

    Ever so slightly, Citan nods. He smiles, though it does not meet his eyes.

    "I hope that you are correct, Miss Croze. It would be a better world, if it could come to pass. The world that we now have and the world we could have... at times, it feels as if it could never be. And yet, that is assuredly a part of the human condition: to strive, regardless."

    In much the same way that she must find her own answers, her own path.

    "If I told you what your path would be, it would not truly be your own."

    It would be the same as that power that she makes use of -- or that uses her.

    And the same as...

    Citan draws away from her, tilting the wooden practice sword down towards the floor until it hangs but limply from his grasp. He extends his free hand outwards, palm forward, as if to signal here an end to their practice.

    Instead, he watches her as she makes her decision -- to keep on learning and growing.

    Because she wants to try again, with everyone, once she knows what she is doing.

    She wants to give an answer to all of them -- her friends. To Sigurd and the rest of the crew.

    His smile -- still not truly meeting his eyes -- widens a touch. "Just like him, I see... Once he understood what it was he had to do, he committed to it utterly." He ducks his head in a short nod, as she dons again glasses -- her own.
    To allow her to, metaphorically, see more clearly again?

    "I do not doubt the same is true for you, Miss Croze. I will look forward to sparring with you again."