[ She laughs softly, but she's sure Maika isn't surprised by that one bit. Of course Aerith would like a girl described as someone who believes in kindness. ]
I get the feeling that you don't exactly mind that you can't get rid of her.
[ And idly, in the back of her mind, she wonders if Maika wouldn't mind if she couldn't get rid of Aerith either. Rough and jagged around the edges, Aerith thinks that Maika is the kind of person who still wants to believe in kindness, despite everything that's told her not to. That kind of person... it's hard for Aerith not to feel a touch of fondness already. ]
[ She tries to make that sound like a complaint. But considering she just all but admitted to Kippa being her reason to keep going, it probably falls a little flat. Maika heaves a sigh of annoyance(?) and flings herself back on the bed to stare up at the underside of the bunk instead. ]
When she gets herself killed running after me, I'm going to tell her "I told you so." [ Maika being Maika, that might even be true. But a little softer: ] ...She keeps me from forgetting things. Forgetting myself.
[ Things she never really believed in, but wanted to. The child who told her auntie that she hated fighting. She thinks if she told Aerith that, she'd understand; that, more than anything, is incentive to change the subject again. It feels like she understands too much already. ]
Aerith turns to look down at Maika, watching her face for a long moment before she shifts and lays down next to her. Only, she's on her side, simply so she can look at Maika's face and take in her expressions as they continue to talk.
Kippa really is an important person, isn't she? It's a good thing Maika has someone like that in her life. ]
I have a few. Cloud, Tifa, Barret, Nanaki, Yuffie... Cait Sith too. They're all very different people, but the one thing they have in common is their kindness.
[ She shifts, getting comfortable because she's going to go through each of them. ]
Cloud is a little clueless, but I know he has a good heart. One day, I hope to see the real him that's buried underneath that storm of everything else. Tifa is strong, and it's her willingness to help other people that make her that way. She's quiet where I'm not, but I think that means we balance each other out.
Barret is big and tall, but the most important thing about him is the love he has for other people. You should see the way he talks about his daughter. I bet you'd get embarrassed. [ Or cringe, because she has a feeling that Maika wouldn't know what to do with someone so openly passionate about their kid. ] Yuffie and Nanaki are just kids, but they're good kids. I feel like I can really talk about things with Nanaki that I can't talk about with anyone else. I guess that's because we're the last of our kind, which I told you about before.
And Cait Sith is new, but... he seems pretty nice. I like him already.
[ "Kind people," huh? Despite herself, Maika's eyebrows lift a tiny bit. She wonders if she could say she's met that many kind people in her life. Or if Aerith is like Kippa, seeing the kindness in strangers until she seems to manifest it from thin air like some sort of sleight-of-hand. ]
Getting embarrassed around that kind of doting parent just encourages them. It's like blood in the water.
[ ...She's pretty sure, although the closest example she has is Seizi with her. That thought stings too much to hold, so she lets it flow past her again and glances over at Aerith. ]
You see the common thread there? You liking everyone, even strangers you barely know?
[ It makes Maika want to ask what Aerith thinks of her... and also very much not want to ask. But she heaves a small sigh, relaxing a little and glancing away again. It's no shortage of people to look after her, anyway. ]
For the last of your kind, no one can say you're all alone, alright. [ And a dozen questions chase themselves through her thoughts but the first to come out is: ] Do all of them know that you're a Cetra?
[ Or those other things that Aerith said at the meeting. What she lived through, what she's seen. ]
[ Come on, Maika, let her feel like she's at least kind of picky! But she does like quite a few of the people here, too, including Maika. For just a moment, she thinks about making that little fact known, but she hesitates just enough that she focuses in on that question instead. ]
They do. Actually...
[ For a brief moment, she wonders if she should tell Maika this at all, but decides that actually, she wouldn't mind if Maika knew this. ]
They rescued me. I got taken by the researchers, but my friends broke in and saved me. [ She smiles, and while it's not as bright as usual, it's sincere. ] I actually met Nanaki in the research facility. We were being experimented on together.
[ Girl, you were trying to have sympathy for a cannibal not that long ago at all. Not that Maika can't appreciate that. But it does earn Aerith a skeptical little look, tinged with some amusement.
Aerith's admission actually gets her to roll on her side to face her, studying her expression now. ]
...You might just have a few good reasons to trust them after all. [ To protect her, and come through for her when she needs it. It's not like Maika can borrow trouble worrying about other people's worlds. But knowing that exists out there somewhere? That isn't nothing. ] Wait, is that why you're on the run, too?
Well... I don't like the researchers back at Shinra.
[ Yeah, that's not really a good answer, is it?
But the unsure look on her face turns into a smile when Maika turns onto her side and they're left facing each other. There's an easy sort of comfort in something like this, one that Aerith welcomes. ]
But you're spot on. That's why we're on the run... mostly. My friends are part of a terrorist group that opposes Shinra, so we were already in trouble. [ She pauses. ] All those soldiers we killed on the way out probably added to it all too.
[ Although, honestly? It's almost a relief to know that Aerith does have that bottom line, and enough regard for herself to hold — if not a grudge, then a flicker of negativity. Something. ]
That'll get their attention, usually. Like that's not what every government keeps soldiers for in the first place. [ She's half surprised that Aerith says that so calmly, half not. She said she'd seen combat before, after all. But people take it differently even so. ] Shinra? Is that your country?
[ How bad is it that a company is effectively their government? Aerith knows that it at least says quite a bit about the place she comes from, and even if Maika is from a world with different technology and terminology, she hopes that the gap isn’t so big that she doesn’t glean the general state of her world. ]
They got real big after they figured out how to harness the world’s life force for electricity. As you can imagine… it’s not so good for the planet.
[ Maika gives a quiet hum as she takes that all in — a disapproving sound, the one her grandmother had so disliked. She can understand the shape of what Aerith is saying, as different as their worlds are. People need energy and power for things. And the people who control that can more or less set their terms. ]
And I can imagine that's not too high on their list of concerns, either. Not if their energy source is what's keeping them in power.
[ That all fits together. Terrorism, her dying planet, the way none of the problems here seem to phase her much. Her world is more like Maika's than this place. ]
...So, what's a Cetra? If we weren't here maybe I could smell the difference. But you look mostly human to me.
[ And the instinctive little whiff she takes — which hopefully Aerith doesn't notice — is only giving her flowers. White flowers. ]
[ What's on their list of concerns is a way of escape from the dying planet, but that's another thing she can get into some other time. There are a lot of moving parts to everything going on back home, and the last thing she wants to do is bore Maika with all of it.
Unfortunately, Maika doesn't escape Aerith's perception check of an 18, because she smiles softly. ]
Just tried to see if you could actually tell here, right? I kinda want to know what you did smell, honestly.
[ But she'll go ahead and explain what a Cetra is right now anyway instead of dwelling. ]
The Cetra are also known as the Ancients, people from a long, long time ago who were the stewards of the planet. We're different from regular humans because we can communicate directly with the lifestream that flows through the planet. What the planet tells me can vary, but... I've known when people have passed before, and other little things like that.
[ Of course Aerith is Avrae's favorite child only when it's time for crimes to be committed. Maika gives a sniff — a huffing sniff, not another scenting sniff — and tosses her hair without answering.
Lilies, maybe? Or jasmine? No, she's not letting her thoughts wander. ]
And you probably know when the planet is hurting. Or dying.
[ Hearing when people pass away, like a nekomancer? Maika doesn't know if that part sounds like a blessing or a curse, either. ]
The Ancients on my planet are strong. Practically immortal. Hundreds of years don't age them much, and they'll heal from almost any wound. Did your planet give you any of that, along with the stewardship job? Or just... talking?
[ Has Maika been having casual conversations this whole time with someone actually a few thousand years old? It wouldn't be the first time. But it would shift her perspective a little. She peers more intently at Aerith's expression, like she's trying to read signs of secret age there. ]
[ There's no secret wisdom written on her face, just her bangs slightly encroaching on her cheek and her bright green eyes watching as Maika studies her. A small drop of mirth rests in her eyes too, manifesting in the bright way she stares back, her lips curved in a little smile. ]
Just talking. Sounds pretty boring when I put it like that, doesn't it? There's probably more that we can do, but I'll never know it. My mom was the last one who knew anything about the Cetra at all.
[ And idly she wonders if Maika is ever going to tell her what she smelled just now, but she doesn't say it, content to lay here and wait for Maika's assessment of her face instead. ]
It's not boring. It's like sending you to the frontlines stark naked.
[ How are they supposed to protect anything with such a fragile power?
Then again... it's easy to underestimate soft things, small things. What is peace and understandings and great strength made up of if not talking? Aerith looks so strangely relaxed right now, as if she's confident despite everything. Her smile eases some of Maika's formless worry despite all logic. ]
[ Is this something she should tell Maika? Aerith doesn't make a habit of divulging things like this, but there's a strange sort of comfort between them, here on this bed. The soft mattress, the heat of the tea, the warmth emanating from Maika even though it's so, so clear she tries to encase herself in a cold ice. That little shield didn't seem to last long, did it?
Like this, it's easy to open up, to turn to the page of one of the worst moments of her life and speak it into existence. ]
I was seven, so... about fifteen years ago. We just escaped the research labs, but mom had been undergoing so many harsh experiments that she didn't make it far past the train platform. I tried to find a doctor to help her, but you know how undercities go.
[ No one listened. ]
But I got lucky. Someone took me in, no questions asked.
[ The numbers help, give her something simple and factual to focus on. That makes Aerith twenty-two now; seven was a few years younger than Maika was when her mother died.
If she lets herself venture beyond the factual it's too easy to picture. She knows how cities wracked with hardship are, how people are. She doesn't need Aerith to tell her to know exactly the reaction of the people passing by, or the way a small child would have called in desperation and fading hope. She's seen it so many times. ]
No one answered. They looked away and pretended not to see you, walked faster, shook off your hand. No one would have wanted to take care of anyone but themself.
[ She understands a little better now the weight behind the emotions on Aerith's face when she talked about Ushirono. After living through that, could her hatred be any less than Maika's? It's just balanced with things Maika never had.
She shifts a little, unsure what words she could choose in comfort. Hard truths are easy. This part is the unknown. ]
You found a new home. But you never forgot. Is that it?
[ And Maika has the right of it too, whatever she's picturing as accurate as can be. Walking faster, pretending not to see her, even yelling at her and telling her to leave... The harsh realities of life in the undercity were made clear to her within minutes of arriving—an introduction to a cruel world after just having left what was essentially a confinement. ]
But all I could do after that was pick myself up and keep looking forward. People can be cruel, but that was no reason for me to be the same way, y'know? I had to keep going, no matter what other people had to say about it.
[ Maybe it's overly positive of her, but she knows it isn't naivety. ]
[ Maika falls silent for a long while, letting that thought sink into her bones. Aerith says it so lightly, but what had that cost? Everything Maika's ever done in her life is to become strong — to chase her mother's ambition, her mother's approval. That strength never left any room for kindness. Failing to answer force with force would just encourage more of the same.
What would it take to absorb that without coming to hate everyone and everything? A lot more than Maika ever had. ]
...Why? How do you keep hoping? When you've seen how people are, why even bother looking for the good in them? What good does it do anyone if it's buried down under their selfishness and brutality?
Because there are plenty of people where it isn't. Sometimes they get drowned out by all the bad people, but I know that there are plenty out there who really, really care.
[ The random people they've encountered on their journey, Jesse, Wedge, Biggs... Zack.
They're out there, that much Aerith knows. Even if they're now gone, they're still people that made an impact on the world, that spread their kindness in little ripples that will continue to fan out into the world. ]
Sometimes you have to really look for it to even see it at all, but when you're able to latch onto that brightness in someone's heart, you can end up looking right into the sun.
I'm not saying you have to look for it yourself, especially with everything it sounds like you've been through. [ It's an assumption, but Maika's words and demeanor seem to suggest that she's seen plenty of horrors of her own. ] But I think you can find it, if you want to. You'll be able to find more people like Kippa.
[ Continuing to look for hope, no matter how many times you keep losing it? It's exhausting. It's an impossible standard to hold yourself to.
And it's dazzling, too. Maybe unexpectedly, Maika doesn't have a cynical rebuttal ready. She just makes a thoughtful hum, though her gaze slides away from Aerith's face for a moment. ]
Kippa would tell me that it's exactly because of how I am that I just have to look twice as hard as anyone else would. So maybe you're softer than a silly fox-child.
[ There's a wry note in her voice, and a tiny spark of teasing. She seems to find her equilibrium after a moment, enough to look Aerith in the eyes again. ]
I wasn't asking for me. You're just... a puzzle I can't figure out. So much for my supposed ability to read people.
[ Although if she had to apply her particular skillset to Aerith... people attribute the motives to others that they feel most instinctively themselves. If Aerith looks for caring in places that don't show it, it suggests she's someone who cares so deeply that she searches for that reflection in others. ]
[ Maybe she really is softer. Aerith doesn't know that that's necessarily true, but it certainly could be. She's always been sensitive and prone to upset, even while looking for the things in life that could bring a smile to her face.
That isn't a bad thing though, and if anything, Aerith thinks it's a strength. It's why it's easy for her to take it as the tease that it is, a little smile settling on her lips. ]
A puzzle, huh? I hope that's a good thing.
[ A compliment, maybe? She would gladly take it as Maika calling her cool and mysterious, but the tone of their conversation leads her to believe that that isn't exactly the case. Despite the warm glow of the atmosphere that has settled between them, she knows that what Maika says goes deeper than just a compliment. ]
[ Although Maika does exactly the opposite of her words, rolling onto her back again to look up at the underside of the bunk bed above them. She can practically still feel the warmth Aerith's smile on her skin like the sun bearing down on the steppes. ]
...No one's been using this bed since I've been here. If you don't want to go back to an empty room tonight, you might as well take it.
[ Would she just run herself in circles with her thoughts if she went back alone? Maika probably would. ]
[ For a moment, Aerith doesn't really know what to do with that, her pulse quickening. Feeling flustered is foreign to her, and that Maika looks away only serves to make her feel... unsure. She's well aware that she isn't the only one who feels that little spark, and she lets it settle between them for now, a slow burning ember that one of them will need to address at some point. ]
Is that an invitation to stay over?
[ Despite her teasing tone, she wears a soft smile. ]
I'll take you up on that offer, then. I think I'd feel better not being alone.
[ Maika had just been opening her mouth to offer to take Aerith's room instead — she didn't know Ushirono well, and she's slept in more haunted places — but that answer gets her to shut it again with a quiet huff.
Is she surprised that Aerith wants her to stay? She's not sure. She hasn't exactly been the comforting type for at least seven years. But sometimes, anyone is better than nothing. She can tell herself it makes sense like that. ]
Take it whenever you want it. It's not like the room is really mine in the first place.
[ Which is a roundabout way of saying Aerith is welcome here when she chooses, really. ]
Then I'll take it tonight, if you don't mind having a guest stay over.
[ She knows Maika wouldn't offer if she didn't mean it. After all, she's the sort of woman who is well aware of this being an intrusion on her space. Yet... Aerith can't help but reach out for that little extra bit of confirmation anyway. ]
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linknet2024-07-26 02:53 pm
no subject
[ She laughs softly, but she's sure Maika isn't surprised by that one bit. Of course Aerith would like a girl described as someone who believes in kindness. ]
I get the feeling that you don't exactly mind that you can't get rid of her.
[ And idly, in the back of her mind, she wonders if Maika wouldn't mind if she couldn't get rid of Aerith either. Rough and jagged around the edges, Aerith thinks that Maika is the kind of person who still wants to believe in kindness, despite everything that's told her not to. That kind of person... it's hard for Aerith not to feel a touch of fondness already. ]
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[ She tries to make that sound like a complaint. But considering she just all but admitted to Kippa being her reason to keep going, it probably falls a little flat. Maika heaves a sigh of annoyance(?) and flings herself back on the bed to stare up at the underside of the bunk instead. ]
When she gets herself killed running after me, I'm going to tell her "I told you so." [ Maika being Maika, that might even be true. But a little softer: ] ...She keeps me from forgetting things. Forgetting myself.
[ Things she never really believed in, but wanted to. The child who told her auntie that she hated fighting. She thinks if she told Aerith that, she'd understand; that, more than anything, is incentive to change the subject again. It feels like she understands too much already. ]
Tell me about your friends.
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Aerith turns to look down at Maika, watching her face for a long moment before she shifts and lays down next to her. Only, she's on her side, simply so she can look at Maika's face and take in her expressions as they continue to talk.
Kippa really is an important person, isn't she? It's a good thing Maika has someone like that in her life. ]
I have a few. Cloud, Tifa, Barret, Nanaki, Yuffie... Cait Sith too. They're all very different people, but the one thing they have in common is their kindness.
[ She shifts, getting comfortable because she's going to go through each of them. ]
Cloud is a little clueless, but I know he has a good heart. One day, I hope to see the real him that's buried underneath that storm of everything else. Tifa is strong, and it's her willingness to help other people that make her that way. She's quiet where I'm not, but I think that means we balance each other out.
Barret is big and tall, but the most important thing about him is the love he has for other people. You should see the way he talks about his daughter. I bet you'd get embarrassed. [ Or cringe, because she has a feeling that Maika wouldn't know what to do with someone so openly passionate about their kid. ] Yuffie and Nanaki are just kids, but they're good kids. I feel like I can really talk about things with Nanaki that I can't talk about with anyone else. I guess that's because we're the last of our kind, which I told you about before.
And Cait Sith is new, but... he seems pretty nice. I like him already.
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Getting embarrassed around that kind of doting parent just encourages them. It's like blood in the water.
[ ...She's pretty sure, although the closest example she has is Seizi with her. That thought stings too much to hold, so she lets it flow past her again and glances over at Aerith. ]
You see the common thread there? You liking everyone, even strangers you barely know?
[ It makes Maika want to ask what Aerith thinks of her... and also very much not want to ask. But she heaves a small sigh, relaxing a little and glancing away again. It's no shortage of people to look after her, anyway. ]
For the last of your kind, no one can say you're all alone, alright. [ And a dozen questions chase themselves through her thoughts but the first to come out is: ] Do all of them know that you're a Cetra?
[ Or those other things that Aerith said at the meeting. What she lived through, what she's seen. ]
no subject
[ Come on, Maika, let her feel like she's at least kind of picky! But she does like quite a few of the people here, too, including Maika. For just a moment, she thinks about making that little fact known, but she hesitates just enough that she focuses in on that question instead. ]
They do. Actually...
[ For a brief moment, she wonders if she should tell Maika this at all, but decides that actually, she wouldn't mind if Maika knew this. ]
They rescued me. I got taken by the researchers, but my friends broke in and saved me. [ She smiles, and while it's not as bright as usual, it's sincere. ] I actually met Nanaki in the research facility. We were being experimented on together.
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[ Girl, you were trying to have sympathy for a cannibal not that long ago at all. Not that Maika can't appreciate that. But it does earn Aerith a skeptical little look, tinged with some amusement.
Aerith's admission actually gets her to roll on her side to face her, studying her expression now. ]
...You might just have a few good reasons to trust them after all. [ To protect her, and come through for her when she needs it. It's not like Maika can borrow trouble worrying about other people's worlds. But knowing that exists out there somewhere? That isn't nothing. ] Wait, is that why you're on the run, too?
no subject
[ Yeah, that's not really a good answer, is it?
But the unsure look on her face turns into a smile when Maika turns onto her side and they're left facing each other. There's an easy sort of comfort in something like this, one that Aerith welcomes. ]
But you're spot on. That's why we're on the run... mostly. My friends are part of a terrorist group that opposes Shinra, so we were already in trouble. [ She pauses. ] All those soldiers we killed on the way out probably added to it all too.
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[ Although, honestly? It's almost a relief to know that Aerith does have that bottom line, and enough regard for herself to hold — if not a grudge, then a flicker of negativity. Something. ]
That'll get their attention, usually. Like that's not what every government keeps soldiers for in the first place. [ She's half surprised that Aerith says that so calmly, half not. She said she'd seen combat before, after all. But people take it differently even so. ] Shinra? Is that your country?
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Shinra… is a company. An electric power company.
[ How bad is it that a company is effectively their government? Aerith knows that it at least says quite a bit about the place she comes from, and even if Maika is from a world with different technology and terminology, she hopes that the gap isn’t so big that she doesn’t glean the general state of her world. ]
They got real big after they figured out how to harness the world’s life force for electricity. As you can imagine… it’s not so good for the planet.
no subject
And I can imagine that's not too high on their list of concerns, either. Not if their energy source is what's keeping them in power.
[ That all fits together. Terrorism, her dying planet, the way none of the problems here seem to phase her much. Her world is more like Maika's than this place. ]
...So, what's a Cetra? If we weren't here maybe I could smell the difference. But you look mostly human to me.
[ And the instinctive little whiff she takes — which hopefully Aerith doesn't notice — is only giving her flowers. White flowers. ]
no subject
[ What's on their list of concerns is a way of escape from the dying planet, but that's another thing she can get into some other time. There are a lot of moving parts to everything going on back home, and the last thing she wants to do is bore Maika with all of it.
Unfortunately, Maika doesn't escape Aerith's perception check of an 18, because she smiles softly. ]
Just tried to see if you could actually tell here, right? I kinda want to know what you did smell, honestly.
[ But she'll go ahead and explain what a Cetra is right now anyway instead of dwelling. ]
The Cetra are also known as the Ancients, people from a long, long time ago who were the stewards of the planet. We're different from regular humans because we can communicate directly with the lifestream that flows through the planet. What the planet tells me can vary, but... I've known when people have passed before, and other little things like that.
no subject
Lilies, maybe? Or jasmine? No, she's not letting her thoughts wander. ]
And you probably know when the planet is hurting. Or dying.
[ Hearing when people pass away, like a nekomancer? Maika doesn't know if that part sounds like a blessing or a curse, either. ]
The Ancients on my planet are strong. Practically immortal. Hundreds of years don't age them much, and they'll heal from almost any wound. Did your planet give you any of that, along with the stewardship job? Or just... talking?
[ Has Maika been having casual conversations this whole time with someone actually a few thousand years old? It wouldn't be the first time. But it would shift her perspective a little. She peers more intently at Aerith's expression, like she's trying to read signs of secret age there. ]
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Just talking. Sounds pretty boring when I put it like that, doesn't it? There's probably more that we can do, but I'll never know it. My mom was the last one who knew anything about the Cetra at all.
[ And idly she wonders if Maika is ever going to tell her what she smelled just now, but she doesn't say it, content to lay here and wait for Maika's assessment of her face instead. ]
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[ How are they supposed to protect anything with such a fragile power?
Then again... it's easy to underestimate soft things, small things. What is peace and understandings and great strength made up of if not talking? Aerith looks so strangely relaxed right now, as if she's confident despite everything. Her smile eases some of Maika's formless worry despite all logic. ]
...You lost her. How long ago?
no subject
Like this, it's easy to open up, to turn to the page of one of the worst moments of her life and speak it into existence. ]
I was seven, so... about fifteen years ago. We just escaped the research labs, but mom had been undergoing so many harsh experiments that she didn't make it far past the train platform. I tried to find a doctor to help her, but you know how undercities go.
[ No one listened. ]
But I got lucky. Someone took me in, no questions asked.
no subject
If she lets herself venture beyond the factual it's too easy to picture. She knows how cities wracked with hardship are, how people are. She doesn't need Aerith to tell her to know exactly the reaction of the people passing by, or the way a small child would have called in desperation and fading hope. She's seen it so many times. ]
No one answered. They looked away and pretended not to see you, walked faster, shook off your hand. No one would have wanted to take care of anyone but themself.
[ She understands a little better now the weight behind the emotions on Aerith's face when she talked about Ushirono. After living through that, could her hatred be any less than Maika's? It's just balanced with things Maika never had.
She shifts a little, unsure what words she could choose in comfort. Hard truths are easy. This part is the unknown. ]
You found a new home. But you never forgot. Is that it?
no subject
[ And Maika has the right of it too, whatever she's picturing as accurate as can be. Walking faster, pretending not to see her, even yelling at her and telling her to leave... The harsh realities of life in the undercity were made clear to her within minutes of arriving—an introduction to a cruel world after just having left what was essentially a confinement. ]
But all I could do after that was pick myself up and keep looking forward. People can be cruel, but that was no reason for me to be the same way, y'know? I had to keep going, no matter what other people had to say about it.
[ Maybe it's overly positive of her, but she knows it isn't naivety. ]
no subject
What would it take to absorb that without coming to hate everyone and everything? A lot more than Maika ever had. ]
...Why? How do you keep hoping? When you've seen how people are, why even bother looking for the good in them? What good does it do anyone if it's buried down under their selfishness and brutality?
no subject
[ The random people they've encountered on their journey, Jesse, Wedge, Biggs... Zack.
They're out there, that much Aerith knows. Even if they're now gone, they're still people that made an impact on the world, that spread their kindness in little ripples that will continue to fan out into the world. ]
Sometimes you have to really look for it to even see it at all, but when you're able to latch onto that brightness in someone's heart, you can end up looking right into the sun.
I'm not saying you have to look for it yourself, especially with everything it sounds like you've been through. [ It's an assumption, but Maika's words and demeanor seem to suggest that she's seen plenty of horrors of her own. ] But I think you can find it, if you want to. You'll be able to find more people like Kippa.
no subject
And it's dazzling, too. Maybe unexpectedly, Maika doesn't have a cynical rebuttal ready. She just makes a thoughtful hum, though her gaze slides away from Aerith's face for a moment. ]
Kippa would tell me that it's exactly because of how I am that I just have to look twice as hard as anyone else would. So maybe you're softer than a silly fox-child.
[ There's a wry note in her voice, and a tiny spark of teasing. She seems to find her equilibrium after a moment, enough to look Aerith in the eyes again. ]
I wasn't asking for me. You're just... a puzzle I can't figure out. So much for my supposed ability to read people.
[ Although if she had to apply her particular skillset to Aerith... people attribute the motives to others that they feel most instinctively themselves. If Aerith looks for caring in places that don't show it, it suggests she's someone who cares so deeply that she searches for that reflection in others. ]
no subject
That isn't a bad thing though, and if anything, Aerith thinks it's a strength. It's why it's easy for her to take it as the tease that it is, a little smile settling on her lips. ]
A puzzle, huh? I hope that's a good thing.
[ A compliment, maybe? She would gladly take it as Maika calling her cool and mysterious, but the tone of their conversation leads her to believe that that isn't exactly the case. Despite the warm glow of the atmosphere that has settled between them, she knows that what Maika says goes deeper than just a compliment. ]
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[ Although Maika does exactly the opposite of her words, rolling onto her back again to look up at the underside of the bunk bed above them. She can practically still feel the warmth Aerith's smile on her skin like the sun bearing down on the steppes. ]
...No one's been using this bed since I've been here. If you don't want to go back to an empty room tonight, you might as well take it.
[ Would she just run herself in circles with her thoughts if she went back alone? Maika probably would. ]
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Is that an invitation to stay over?
[ Despite her teasing tone, she wears a soft smile. ]
I'll take you up on that offer, then. I think I'd feel better not being alone.
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Is she surprised that Aerith wants her to stay? She's not sure. She hasn't exactly been the comforting type for at least seven years. But sometimes, anyone is better than nothing. She can tell herself it makes sense like that. ]
Take it whenever you want it. It's not like the room is really mine in the first place.
[ Which is a roundabout way of saying Aerith is welcome here when she chooses, really. ]
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[ She knows Maika wouldn't offer if she didn't mean it. After all, she's the sort of woman who is well aware of this being an intrusion on her space. Yet... Aerith can't help but reach out for that little extra bit of confirmation anyway. ]
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